Switching guide

How to get your club data out of BMABA Club Manager

BMABA's club management platform keeps your students, registers and gradings. BMABA says you can export student data, but doesn't publish the steps. Here's what to do about that, and how to bring your students into BeltManager.

Researched 7 November 2026.

What BMABA documents

BMABA (the British Martial Arts & Boxing Association) calls its software the Club Management Platform; you may know it as Club Manager. BMABA's own page lists student records, registers, grade and belt tracking, and payments among its features [1].

BMABA's student insurance and licensing page says the free club tools let you "export student data" [2]. We couldn't find a page in BMABA's public handbook [3] that explains how to export student records, which fields an export includes, or what format it comes in.

So there are three routes, in order of effort.

Route 1: look for an export in your account

Sign in to MyBMABA and open your student list. If there's an export or download option, choose CSV (or Excel, then save it as CSV). Check that the file includes each student's date of birth and their parent or guardian's contact details: BeltManager needs both for under-18s.

Route 2: ask BMABA in writing

If you can't find an export, email BMABA (its contact details are on bmaba.org.uk) and ask for a spreadsheet of your club's students with:

first name, last name and date of birth;
parent or guardian name, email and mobile number;
current grade or belt, and the class or group each student trains in;
status (current or lapsed).

Ask for it as a CSV or Excel file, and ask when you can expect it. Putting the request in writing gives you a record of what you asked for and when.

Route 3: build the spreadsheet yourself

For a small club this is often quickest. In BeltManager, open Students → Import and click Download template. It has every column BeltManager reads and two example rows. Fill in one row per student from your register, membership forms or the student list on screen, then save it as CSV.

Only the first three columns (first name, last name, date of birth) are required, plus a guardian for anyone under 18. Everything else can be added later.

Grades, insurance and licences

BMABA describes its Lifetime Student Grade Register as a permanent national record of a student's grades [4]. Moving your day-to-day records to BeltManager doesn't need to touch it: put each student's current grade in the Current belt column and BeltManager tracks progress from there.

BeltManager doesn't sell insurance or licences. If you stay with BMABA for those, check with BMABA how your membership works if you stop using its club platform, before you change anything.

Import the file into BeltManager

First, tidy the file

Every student needs a date of birth. It's how BeltManager knows who is under 18 and needs a guardian.Write dates as DD/MM/YYYY (for example 14/03/2016) or YYYY-MM-DD. Two-digit years such as 14/03/16 are refused rather than guessed.
Students under 18 need a guardian on the same row: a guardian name, plus a guardian email or phone. Siblings who share a guardian end up linked to the same guardian record.
Phone numbers must be mobiles. UK mobiles (07… or +44 7…) are accepted; landlines are refused. If your file has landlines, set that column to "Don't import" and add numbers later.
Status can only be "active" or "trial". Remove students who have left, or set the status column to "Don't import" and everyone comes in as active.
Only bring what you need. Medical notes import if you map them, but leave out anything you don't need to run your classes safely.
Size: up to 1,000 students, 50 columns and 2 MB per file. Split a bigger file in two.

Then import it

Sign in to BeltManager as the school owner and open Students → Import.
Choose your BMABA CSV file. Want to see the expected layout first? Click Download template.
Match your columns. BeltManager recognises these headings automatically, and common variations such as "Parent email", "Belt", "Rank" or "Class":
- First name
- Last name
- Date of birth
- Email
- Phone
- Guardian name
- Guardian email
- Guardian phone
- Group
- Current belt
- Status
- Medical notes
- Emergency contact name
- Emergency contact phone
First name, Last name and Date of birth are required. Set any other column to "Don't import".
Check every row. The preview shows what will happen to each student: created, updated, skipped or an error. A student already in BeltManager with the same name and date of birth is skipped, unless you tick "Update students who are already in BeltManager". If any row has an error, nothing is saved: fix those rows and check again.
Import. A Group name you don't have yet becomes a new group, and its students become its regulars. A Current belt you don't have yet is added to your belts: if you teach more than one style, write it as Karate: Yellow so BeltManager knows which ladder it belongs to.
Changed your mind? You can undo an import within 24 hours from the import history on the same page.

Card details never move by CSV

No spreadsheet carries a family's saved card, and BeltManager never takes card numbers from a file. Card billing in BeltManager switches on in April 2027: when it does, families add their card themselves. Until then you can record payments by hand. Keep your BMABA billing running until you're ready to switch it off.

Stuck on a column? Send us the file's column headings (not the data) and we'll tell you how to map them.

Get started free

Sources

All pages accessed 7 November 2026. Menus and labels change; if a step doesn't match what you see, the vendor's own help pages are the authority.

BMABA: The Free, Award-Winning Club Management Platform For Martial Arts
BMABA: Martial Arts Student Insurance, Licensing & Membership
BMABA Handbook (help articles) (no article on exporting student records found)
BMABA: Lifetime Student Grade Register