AGM/Committee Feedback

[robert]

OK Guys and Girls.

Add below to this thread a summary of your concerns/issues and I will raise them with the rest of the committee.

STAY ON TOPIC and if someone else has already raised an issue that you want to raise, DO NOT ADD "ME TOO"!!!!

Lets keep this post focused, so I can present the concerns in a constructive manner please!!!!!

[Andy S]

Rob, well done for posting this thread.
If I may be the first to air some general concerns;
1. Membership. There appear to be some faults with the membership scheme, some have to wait several months for this to be fully processed, incl the site. Some like me were terminated at the end of Dec when I still had 3 months to run.
I seem to recall last year it being said that memberships would not all finish in Dec so as to spread the workload, that appears to have changed again. Is there now too much work for one volunteer and if so can it not be shared ?
2. Merchandise/Regalia. Several requests over the last 12 months or so for club merchandise to resell at shows etc and requests for a club banner(s). have resulted in being ignored or just not available, then blow me down not 3-4 weeks later at the next show its all there ? ie an inconsitency across the regions.
3. General Response Times from the Committee. I think this was highlighted recently regarding our public liability insurance situation. It took several months, e-mails & phone calls to obtain confirmation and details. It would appear that no-one seem to know where the paperwork was, and people were passed from pillar to post trying to find out the info.
4. Running Costs.
We are aware of rising costs throughout our lives, and this also includes the club, recent suggestions re the printing etc of our magazine are I believe going to be disussed at the AGM, surely with the information supplied this should have been done sooner than that, in an effort to contain costs.
Postage costs I imagine are also high, judging by the number of times I recv letters re membership etc, is it not possible to reduce these by using e-mail ? Certainly for those that have it anyway, yes there will always be some that do not have access etc and these will have to remain as a postal service, but membership, AGM etc could in the majority be issued electronically.
A simple database of members e-mail addresses, mail merged onto the relevant document and its done ( sorry dont meant to teach anyone to suck eggs).

Just a few observations to get things started. Non of the above are aimed at any one individual, so please do not take any personal offence, its just my observations over the last 18 months or so.

[adricar2]

i would like to bring up the issue that, if a banner for the site is purchased, as i have done, then a receipt for it is supplied for the money. Can you please arrange for one to be sent to me please..

[Paul B]

One that I was planning on bringing up is that of membership lists. As a regional organiser, I am not updated on new members and have not received a listing for nearly 3 years.

I am frequently getting guys turn up at our meets saying they have been members for several years and had not had any contact from me or our branch. New members keep our club fresh and developing but we need to make new members feel welcome and I am keen on getting to them before they get disillusioned.

Paul

[robert]

If you do post here, could you put who you are in full instead of just your forum name, it would help tremendously.

[Paul B]

Sorry Rob

Paul B = Paul Birch, Regional Organiser - Bristol/South Glos area

[robert]

Originally Posted by Paul B

Sorry Rob

Paul B = Paul Birch, Regional Organiser - Bristol/South Glos area

Paul

Not directed at you specifically, as we know who the reprobates that run the regions are, more for the general reprobates.

[Andy S]

Appologies Rob
Andy S - Andy Sceal, Southeast co-organiser.

[BILKO]

LUKE SELBY ( BILKO )
ESSEX /HERTS REP

A few issues I would like to see answers to

Membership - Obviously the first thing is why the membership system has been such a shambles for such a long time, as this isn’t a recent problem it’s been going on for at least a couple of years if not longer.

Why have I never received any updated members lists for my area?

Accounts - I would like to see a brief itemised set of accounts handed out to all the members that actually show us what the clubs money has been spent on, not just one line saying we’ve spent £38.000, it would be good to see the forum running cost, the printing cost, the postage costs, how much was spent on banners and regalia, insurance etc, also a breakdown of income from magazine advertising and web sponsors. With a club this size, and members from all walks of life, I am sure that within the club we might have an Accountant, a Printer an Insurance Broker etc who might be able to reduce costs if we knew how much they were, which can’t be a bad thing.

Printing - A member of the Essex Club went out of his way to find cheaper printers and this was put forward, however nothing was done about it, why was there no action taken, not even a simple phone call.

Banners – I think that the committee should rethink the £30 deposit they are asking for from the Area Reps, I don’t know why you are asking for this, (I know the reasoning behind it) but £30 is a lot of money to expect a rep to fork out and surely a club banner at shows will in the long term increase revenue, which should pay for new Banners if the old ones become tatty. If we can spend so much money on a club magazine, which only goes out to existing members, then surely a few hundred pounds spent on banners that may encourage new membership and heighten the public’s awareness of the club is worth considering.

Magazine – The latest magazine has 44 pages, 11 of these are taken up by advertising, the income from the advertising alone should be covering the majority of the cost of the mag, or are we subsidising the advertisers?.
Use thinner paper if it cuts printing costs, I’m sure no one would have a problem with that if it means keeping membership fees down.

Committee nomination – Why was the committee nomination forms sent out too late for anyone to send back in time before the deadline?

Club calendar – announcements should be placed on the forum as well as the magazine telling people to get their pictures in by a certain time, the pictures could be put on the forum and voted upon which ones should be included.

Committee’s visibility on the forum – it would be nice to see more committee members using the forum, to answer questions and get feedback and ideas, instead of leaving it up to Robert to answer all questions about the club.

thanks Rob

[route66]

Steve & Eileen Brown (ex) Regional Reps - East Anglian CRC

Regional Liaison - I understand the committee has a regional liaison function, our experience has been that any liaison between regions has only been carried out only a local level between regions. It appears that some regions are not aware of the activities or function of other regions. Furthermore, are the newer regional reps aware of the availability of a regional membership list and support from the committee for expenses with regard to the production of regional newsletters?

Regional membership list - when available, we used this to provide a distribution mailing list for our regional newsletter. However, the data we used was always old / out of date and we found it a problem to access up to date details.

Regional Expenses - on a positive note, expenses claims for the postage and printing for our regional newsletter were always dealt with and paid promptly by the treasurer.