Membership renewals

[Paul Buswell]

I was a little surprised to learn that on grounds of cost the ECF will not be sending out renewal invitations to members for whom it has no e-mail address. I believe that in the general population that implies at least 15% and to me it seems a false economy. Do others agree or disagree?

PB

[Michael Flatt]

It does seem to be a strange and perverse decision.

If some members prefer not to use email why should an organisation seeking to increase its membership want to alienate a significant proportion of the membership by refusing to communicate with them?

Surely a simple rule of Public Relations is to communicate important information to members?

[Andrew Bak]

It does seem to be a strange and perverse decision.

If some members prefer not to use email why should an organisation seeking to increase its membership want to alienate a significant proportion of the membership by refusing to communicate with them?

Surely a simple rule of Public Relations is to communicate important information to members?

The ECF isn't refusing to communicate with anyone. It's choosing not to waste significant money on sending postal instructions to members who have mostly renewed their membership in the past and would know how to do so without being told!

Also clubs that need their players to be members are also going to tell their members how to renew, or even do the paperwork themselves on behalf of the player!

"Alienating a significant proportion of the membership by refusing to communicate with them"!? Jeez.

[Roger de Coverly]

I was a little surprised to learn that on grounds of cost the ECF will not be sending out renewal invitations to members for whom it has no e-mail address.

We know that the ECF deluded itself into thinking that collecting from 10,000 individuals would be cheaper than collecting from 250 chess organisations. I suppose it has to justify this somehow. I would have thought it a good way of reducing the number of players myself. Those players who members of clubs and play in leagues will presumably have their captains and secretaries badgering them so as to save £ 2 per head per game, but the same doesn't apply to Congresses.

Actually I don't believe the ECF has yet sent out any renewal invitations even where it has an email address. So anyone entering a Congress from 1st September onwards has to make a conditional statement about whether they are a member.

[Sean Hewitt]

The ECF isn't refusing to communicate with anyone. It's choosing not to waste significant money on sending postal instructions to members who have mostly renewed their membership in the past and would know how to do so without being told!

Quite so. These members managed to join last year without receiving an expensive piece of snail mail telling them to do so. It seems reasonable to suppost that they might manage it again.

It is odd that the ECF is criticised by some for making a sensible, cost saving decision. No doubt, had they decided to send out postal reminders, they would have been accused of wasting money!

[Angus French]

I think I agree with the decision.

It would be nice to nice to receive a renewal but:
- there is a cost, both for postage and also for materials and admin/labour at the ECF Office (which won't be trivial as a percentage of the membership fee);
- it will be difficult for players not to know that a renewal is due - all renewals will be due at the same time; clubs will presumably chase their members; congresses won't allow entry without membership or payment of the pay-to-play fee.

[Roger de Coverly]

- it will be difficult for players not to know that a renewal is due - all renewals will be due at the same time; clubs will presumably chase their members; congresses won't allow entry without membership or payment of the pay-to-play fee.

Actually not all fees are due at the same time. Anyone who took out a three year membership will not need to renew either this year or next. By 2015, they may well have forgotten whether they renew in 2015 or 2016.

How though, is the ECF expecting players without email addresses to renew?

If someone phones the ECF Office and says they want to become a member, presumably they go through as a new player unless someone or something spots the match to existing details.

There were numerous new MO agreements signed. Are there any statistics as to how many players used them? These also complicate the renewal process.

[Sean Hewitt]

How though, is the ECF expecting players without email addresses to renew?

I would think most would renew in the same way that they joined last year - whether that be via an MO, over the phone or online. However, they don't have to. They can renew via any medium they choose though it's cheaper to do it online or via an MO.

[Barry Sandercock]

I renewed my ECF gold membership at Torquay with one of the ECF staff ( I believe her name is Cynthia Gurney ) but I have not received a receipt or new membership card yet. I trust this is OK.

[Roger de Coverly]

I renewed my ECF gold membership at Torquay with one of the ECF staff ( I believe her name is Cynthia Gurney ) but I have not received a receipt or new membership card yet. I trust this is OK.

According to the ECF online list, your membership expires 31st August 2013.

A handful of people have had their renewals processed. The ECF just loves setting problems for those who download and use the data. It's indicating renewals by the string
Paid Gold (expires 31 Aug 2013); Paid Gold (expires 31 Aug 2014)
It's just that every so often, it does it the other way round, as in
Paid Bronze (expires 31 Aug 2014); Paid Silver (expires 31 Aug 2013)

Still Congress organisers are accepting entries for events after 1st September 2013 on supposition or promise of membership renewals.

[Christopher Kreuzer]

I'm not clear from this thread whether reminder e-mails have been sent out yet for memberships expiring on 31 August 2013? Have they been sent out, or should we expect reminder e-mails closer to the date?

[David Robertson]

I'm baffled already. Do I 'Join'; or do I 'Renew'?

OK, so I click 'Renew'. And now I'm asked for stuff I don't have (username & password). So I sigh, and find the FAQ. This tells me I should receive a renewal email prompt (soon) which will give me the registration details. Hhmm

But I want to complete the business now, not 'soon'. So I click 'Join'. I find my payment preference (Gold until Aug 16), then wonder why £27 x 3 sums to £83. Never mind - what's a couple of quid to worry about? Press on.

Then, aaargh, the dreaded 'personal details' page. Obviously a new member needs to fill this out. But do I? And if I do, will I end up with two records with ECF?

At which point, I quit; and came here to moan

[Sean Hewitt]

I'm baffled already. Do I 'Join'; or do I 'Renew'?

OK, so I click 'Renew'. And now I'm asked for stuff I don't have (username & password). So I sigh, and find the FAQ. This tells me I should receive a renewal email prompt (soon) which will give me the registration details. Hhmm

But I want to complete the business now, not 'soon'. So I click 'Join'. I find my payment preference (Gold until Aug 16), then wonder why £27 x 3 sums to £83. Never mind - what's a couple of quid to worry about? Press on.

Then, aaargh, the dreaded 'personal details' page. Obviously a new member needs to fill this out. But do I? And if I do, will I end up with two records with ECF?

At which point, I quit; and came here to moan

Hi David - your username is your email address. I agree that the term 'username' is confusing and I'll ask if this can be made clear.

If you don't know your password click "Request password reminder" after you've input your email address and then check your inbox. There will be no need to reinput your personal details.

[Roger de Coverly]

I was a little surprised to learn that on grounds of cost the ECF will not be sending out renewal invitations to members for whom it has no e-mail address. I believe that in the general population that implies at least 15% and to me it seems a false economy. Do others agree or disagree?

This is contradicted by what it says on the ECF website under http://www.englishchess.org.uk/membership/tester-2/

If we do not have an e-mail address for you, you should receive a letter from us explaining how you can access the system. This letter will contain a unique system-generated username and password. If you don’t have access to e-mail or the internet, don’t worry – you can still renew and upgrade your membership by post or telephone.

Mind you the website also says

If you have previously provided us with a valid e-mail address, you should receive a renewal e-mail containing your username (your e-mail address), a unique system-generated password and a link to the member login area. You can find the login area

Actually you hope it doesn't send a system-generated password, since if you have previously renewed with paysubsonline, you will already have set up a password. Provided you can remember both the email address used and the password, I'm not sure you really want the ECF changing detail that should be secure to yourself and paysubsonline.

For anybody trying it, the address quoted on the ECF site as "login area" doesn't appear to work. You can go to the paysubsonline site directly and log in directly using the email address from last year. As currently set up, I only got one option, namely a one year renewal of the existing membership category. The site will have been modified recently as there's a mention of the 2014 Olympiad.

[Alex McFarlane]

So the password is my email address.

But which email address? Is it the one the ECF has for me that it wouldn't allow me to use when joining (and the one it usually uses to contact me) or is it my spam email address which I was forced to use to join (which it has used once to contact me and fairly recently)?