ACS Facility Scheduler vs Planning Center

ACS Facility Scheduler is a hosted tool for coordinating church facilities, people, events, and resources. Users can check room, equipment, and people availability by day, week, or month, using one calendar or combining several. Reservations can include setup and teardown time, recurring or multi-day events, and events at multiple locations; separate rooms can also be combined as one schedulable resource. Events may be pending or approved, and canceled events retain their information. Administrators can set who can view or add events and who can edit or approve them. Calendars can sync to Microsoft Outlook, which must be open during synchronization. The included Broadcast web application shows published events on building monitors up to six months ahead and reflects schedule changes. Standard reports include event and resource lists, calendars, request forms, and planning calendars. ACS maintains the hosted application and lists backups, secure data transfer, server maintenance, and 24-hour network support for server connection. Web and Windows access are listed; Windows installation requires Microsoft .NET Framework 4.7 or higher. Pricing is on request, and there is no free plan.

Planning Center is a church ministry platform with products for people management, events, worship planning, donations, groups, and church apps. People centralizes membership information and ministry activity such as attendance, giving, and volunteering. Services supports worship planning, volunteer scheduling, team communication, and rehearsal tools. Other listed capabilities include group management, event registration, child check-in, and SMS messaging. Free plans are listed for Calendar, People, and Services: Calendar includes one room, People has an unlimited database and reporting, and Services includes five team members and 100 MB of storage. The pricing note lists paid access from $5/mo and a 30-day trial; a member limit of 75 is also listed. Services plans include unlimited feature access, teams, service types, and plans, with pricing based on the number of people accessing the system. The Services app supports iOS and Android phones and tablets, but not Windows devices. Integrations include SongSelect, PraiseCharts, Checkr, Mailchimp, Zapier, and third-party tools; an open API is also available. Planning Center states its products suit churches of any size.