Finance Council Meeting

[Roger de Coverly]

Do you really think people making dire forecasts here will either distract or demoralise those implementing this enough to have any effect? Those implementing this should (hopefully) have the self-discipline to not waste time being micromanaged by those posting to this forum... (unless of course they need advice).

Membership advocates have a habit of backing off when asked what their changes mean in practice. If you advocate a policy, you should be prepared to defend it.

From the viewpoint of local organisations, the ECF cannot be prevented from writing its suicide note. They can reserve the right to look to their own survival regardless of the effect on the ECF. Or not, as the life of an ECF director would be much easier if in some way or other, the national chess scene was transformed into a top down organisation where it was local bodies that had to seek permission from the ECF rather than the other way round.

[Paul McKeown]

Sorry, Roger, but I know b****r all about the specifics. And apart from a few people endlessly arguing the toss here, there is very little information being given out by those actually doing the doing. That is why I have been asking questions here, today. If I know b****r all, I can promise you that the average club player will know the Hermitian conjugate of that. And if the details are still being worked out, then it's potentially going to be a mess, because the league AGMs (the main mechanism by which your average club player will be informed) are still to meet, and September 1 is apparently the deadline.

[Paul McKeown]

Can this be confimed as "including" the costs of credit card processing is most unusual

There is usually a volume element, perhaps here as the upper bound on the volume is reasonably well know, it is included?

[Roger de Coverly]

Can this be confimed as "including" the costs of credit card processing is most unusual

Is it likely that the quotation is based on an assumed spilt between credit and debit cards and the outrun will vary with the actual mix? That seemed the basis behind Angus's comparisons. What choices does the ECF have really? If it's going to set up a system capable of collection from 10,000 individuals, it's presumably going to hit transaction or office costs of around 3% to 6% of the amount collected, or more, whatever route it takes.

[Carl Hibbard]

Can this be confimed as "including" the costs of credit card processing is most unusual

There is usually a volume element, perhaps here as the upper bound on the volume is reasonably well know, it is included?

Credit cards cost far more than Debit, so I would expect the ECF to perhaps take a 2% hit to be honest?

[Matt Harrison]

The cvent website says that their software handles all the payment processing to an existing or new merchant account. The ECF will presumably already have one of these and be bearing the cost of processing card payments right now, or indeed of paying in cheques to their bank account. When my charity switched over to handling all small payments online we saw a reduction in cost as the charges for cheque deposits were about the same as card payment processing, but there was much more office admin involved in openingp post, logging cheques, recording them on databases and accounts systems and banking them.

[Roger de Coverly]

And if the details are still being worked out, then it's potentially going to be a mess, because the league AGMs (the main mechanism by which your average club player will be informed) are still to meet, and September 1 is apparently the deadline.

Yet, last October, the Council delegates who voted in favour of the scheme assured the delegates who were against the scheme, that locally their players were fully in favour. If you vote against change, you only have to know that the change is unwelcome and not the full details. If you vote for change, surely you have to know and understand the details? If you think the implementation is being rushed, I would entirely agree. I suppose it's a side effect, but local AGMs, because of the timings and the changing nature of the proposals have never, and will never, have the chance to express their views for or against the supposed final version.

(edit) They can express views, but short of taking direct action against the ECF, can do nothing to steer the ECF in a different direction (/edit)

[Carl Hibbard]

The cvent website says that their software handles all the payment processing to an existing or new merchant account. The ECF will presumably already have one of these and be bearing the cost of processing card payments right now, or indeed of paying in cheques to their bank account. When my charity switched over to handling all small payments online we saw a reduction in cost as the charges for cheque deposits were about the same as card payment processing, but there was much more office admin involved in openingp post, logging cheques, recording them on databases and accounts systems and banking them.

I would agree say 2% on credit cards and perhaps 25p on debit, well of that order anyway

[Roger de Coverly]

When my charity switched over to handling all small payments online we saw a reduction in cost as the charges for cheque deposits were about the same as card payment processing, but there was much more office admin involved in openingp post, logging cheques, recording them on databases and accounts systems and banking them.

The ECF is in a slightly different position as it is proposing a major increase in the number of small payments it handles and rather than having them spread over the year, they are likely to want them to be concentrated in the September and October period.

We've seen that online payments can work for the people doing the paying, provided they have at least a debit card. It's the costs to the collector of the service providers and transaction costs which are marginally controversial.

[Paul Buswell]

Can't we just get the bloody thing done? All several thousand people want to know now is, who do I pay and how much.

I thought we'd established this. The unwritten ECF membership website and choice of £ 12, £ 18 or £ 27 for adults, three times this and a bit for three years worth.

Clubs, counties and leagues still have to decide what to do with players who won't or haven't visited the website and paid up. For that matter, they have to know how to deal with existing members whose membership runs past 31st August 2012.

Clarification please on the £12 / £13 variations I have seen expressed for Bronze Membership.

For Joe Bloggs, who chooses to become a Bronze Member for his own good reasons, who chooses for his own good reasons not to enrol via any other organisation, who never goes online and has no wish to - who just wants to write a cheque and post it to the ECF office and to heck with any discounts for doing it any other way.... how much does he write the cheque for, £12 or £13?

Thank you.

PB

[Sean Hewitt]

Clarification please on the £12 / £13 variations I have seen expressed for Bronze Membership.

For Joe Bloggs, who chooses to become a Bronze Member for his own good reasons, who chooses for his own good reasons not to enrol via any other organisation, who never goes online and has no wish to - who just wants to write a cheque and post it to the ECF office and to heck with any discounts for doing it any other way.... how much does he write the cheque for, £12 or £13?

Thank you.

PB

£13

[Sean Hewitt]

Andrew Farthing was very clear that the £5800 pa fee included all payment processing fees for up to 20,000 memberships.

[Roger de Coverly]

For Joe Bloggs, who chooses to become a Bronze Member for his own good reasons, who chooses for his own good reasons not to enrol via any other organisation, who never goes online and has no wish to - who just wants to write a cheque and post it to the ECF office and to heck with any discounts for doing it any other way.... how much does he write the cheque for, £12 or £13?

Based on the membership docs presented at the Finance council £ 13

Subject to the following discounts:
(a) payment by Bronze, Silver and Gold Full and Concessionary Members direct to ECF via the ECF website of £1 per membership
(b) payment by a Member Organisation that has entered into a Framework Agreement under the Direct Member Bye Laws by 31st October in the year in question of £1 per membership

MO's might tout for business by offering to rebate some or all of their £ 1 commission, but you would have to put the payment through them.

[Roger de Coverly]

Andrew Farthing was very clear that the £5800 pa fee included all payment processing fees for up to 20,000 memberships.

Like the meeting, we're getting far too involved in the detail of electronic processing. But when the cvent system design says that it puts payments collected in your existing merchant account, does this mean that your existing merchant account has no further bank or credit charges? How does this differ from collections using some other e-payment mechanism, for example the COM system?

[Carl Hibbard]

Andrew Farthing was very clear that the £5800 pa fee included all payment processing fees for up to 20,000 memberships.

Ok thanks, I don't see how that actually works without a payment gateway or merchant account where a hit would be taken but then what do I know