Data Developments’ 40th Anniversary – MyRollcall

As of this year, Data Developments has officially written and developed accounting software for churches and charities for 40 years. Since our founding, we’ve created products and services that make accounting and administration easier for real people in everyday situations.  

Most of our customers will be aware of our desktop application ‘Membership Co-ordinator’ and its online application counterpart ‘MyMembershipManager’. But did you know that this product once went under a different name? Or that it was the program that started it all? 

In 1985, two budding software programmers were approached by a local vicar with a specific request. He was looking for a software package to help with managing memberships for his organisation. In response, ‘Rollcall’ was developed that same year. It was a membership administration package that enabled users to record information about families or individuals within their organisation. Within a year of the company’s founding, Rollcall accumulated swift success, paving the way for our other financial packages over the next three years.  

As technology advanced over the years, so, too, did Rollcall. In 1987, it was released for PC and DOS to further help organisations manage their members with less admin work. In 2002, our programming team headed to America to train in a new programming language. The aim was to revolutionise our software and try to make life a little easier for our customers. The training ultimately paid off, leading to the release of our desktop applications between 2004 and 2008. Rollcall was the first of our products to be given a desktop application, its name changing to Membership Co-ordinator. From 2017 onwards, we moved with the times and began releasing online application versions of our desktop products. As a result, Membership Co-ordinator gained its first cloud-based membership system, MyMembershipManager, in 2021. 

At Data Developments, we strive to help organisations focus on their missions while letting the software handle the administrative work. Our company is constantly improving and expanding to better suit our customers’ needs wherever we can. But that doesn’t mean we’ve forgotten our roots. So, to commemorate our 40th milestone, we will be changing the name of our online application MyMembershipManager to MyRollcall. The change will be coming into effect around late summertime, so keep an eye out for more information.