Membership Services

[Maha Chandar]

As a ECF Member and Mom for the Junior players in Hampshire , I would like to have more tournaments in Hampshire for Juniors especially South East.

[John Upham]

As a ECF Member and Mom for the Junior players in Hampshire , I would like to have more tournaments in Hampshire for Juniors especially South East.

Maha,

I have been attempting to discover junior events for the children in my Hampshire school chess clubs. I have failed but I send them to Berkshire junior events instead. If anyone from the HCA can provide a detailed calendar of events I would be most grateful. The focus would be North East Hampshire rather than South East as in Maha's plea.

[Clive Blackburn]

I received an email from the ECF yesterday, as I expect that all members did.

The email is signed by Sean Hewitt and it begins:-

The ECF recently passed the milestone of having 9000 individual members, with more members joining every single day. This is a great achievement, and allows the ECF to offer additional benefits to members that are not available elsewhere.


It goes on to list various benefits of membership, including discounts on chess equipment, chess DVDs and tickets for the Candidates tournament in London.

I really do not see how signing up 9,000 individual members can be considered a "great achievement" when the individuals concerned have very little choice in the matter; they either join the ECF or they give up competitive chess!

[John McKenna]

Come on Clive, give the ECF some credit. But, if anyone is thinking of giving up competitive chess the ECF would like them to join first then give up.

[Roger de Coverly]

the individuals concerned have very little choice in the matter; they either join the ECF or they give up competitive chess!

There are still a number of exemptions. It remains to be seen whether the ECF will implement the process described in the ex-CEOs paper of eighteen months ago of treating the £ 2 per game per head charge as a transitional measure. In effect the ECF would be anticipating FIDE and demanding a membership license as a condition of play.

With there being a prior benchmark of around 15,000 players with at least one graded game a year under the ECF's previous schemes of membership, 9,000 is less than two-thirds of all potential players.

[Clive Blackburn]

Come on Clive, give the ECF some credit.

That is my point John - I have to give the ECF credit, once a year!

[harrylamb]

I got the same email as Clive. In my opinion it is spam. I did not ask for it and I do not want it. Furthermore there is no unsubscribe button. Will the ECF please recognise that sending members unwanted emails will alienate its membership further

[Roger de Coverly]

Furthermore there is no unsubscribe button.

The email says

Members who do not wish to receive details of these offers will, of course, be able to change their account settings accordingly.

I'm not sure how account settings would be changed, the paysubsonline page doesn't have an opt in/out either for ChessMoves or "ECF offers".

[Bill Porter]

Furthermore there is no unsubscribe button.

The email says

Members who do not wish to receive details of these offers will, of course, be able to change their account settings accordingly.

I'm not sure how account settings would be changed, the paysubsonline page doesn't have an opt in/out either for ChessMoves or "ECF offers".

The ECF appears to be on very thin ice and is likely to get banned by its ISP if it doesn't sort this out very soon.

[Sean Hewitt]

I got the same email as Clive. In my opinion it is spam. I did not ask for it and I do not want it. Furthermore there is no unsubscribe button. Will the ECF please recognise that sending members unwanted emails will alienate its membership further

You're wrong as usual. Spam is, by definition, indiscriminate whereas this email was clearly sent solely to ECF Members. You might not want to know how being an ECF member might benefit you, but most players do.

[Sean Hewitt]

The ECF appears to be on very thin ice and is likely to get banned by its ISP if it doesn't sort this out very soon.

Is that your professional opinion?

[Sean Hewitt ECF DoMM]

For those interested in the actual legalities rather than opinion, the ECF would need a 'soft opt in' option if it wanted to market other chess related products to its members. This would be the case if, for example, the ECF wanted to sell chess books or equipment to members.

The ECF does not need such an option for it to be able to tell ECF members what the benefits of the membership they have already purchased are.

Nevertheless, as I said in the email, we will be offering the facility to opt out of receiving emails from the ECF and that's work that's being done as we speak. The ECF does not have to do this but is doing so because it's good customer service. Of course, the ECF has to email its members to tell them about this possibility.

I am very pleased that I have received a number emails which have said how pleased they are that the ECF is trying to do something positive for them though, of course, you can't please all of the people all of the time.

[Carl Hibbard]

Nevertheless, as I said in the email, we will be offering the facility to opt out of receiving emails from the ECF and that's work that's being done as we speak.

This should have been done before the sending out of the mass email which I too would class as spam unless it mentions somewhere about the opt-in default?

[Sean Hewitt]

This should have been done before the sending out of the mass email which I too would class as spam unless it mentions somewhere about the opt-in default?

Then you join harrylamb at the bottom of the class. Spam, by definition, is indiscriminate. This email was not. There is no requirement on the ECF to offer an opt out on this sort of email.

[Richard Bates]

It takes a particular type of mindset to resent 'having' to join an organisation in part because of a perception/belief that that organisation doesn't do anything for them, and then actually use initiatives designed to tackle that perception as evidence reinforcing that resentment...