Membership Services

[Eric Gardiner]

Hi Eric - I can see that the ECF do have an email address for you. Could you PM me your email address so that I can verify it is correct?

Done Thanks to Sean & another member for contacting me here - it seems the problem was simply that the ECF didn't have the correct email address for me.

[John Upham]

a seemingly fairly dubious business without first checking it out

What is the alleged "dubious business" and how can you be certain nobody has "checked it out"?

chess actually being organised.

I guess we need the criteria for what you mean by "being organised" to be able to discuss this.

Could you be explicit?

[Matthew Turner]

Sean,
If you (or someone else within the ECF) has checked out the arrangements for spectators at the Candidates then I'd be grateful if he'd let us know. They don't seem to appear anywhere else.

John,
The E-mail from the ECF doesn't mention any chess being organised, so I've no idea what you mean by criteria.

[Mick Norris]

Organising chess - does the ECF need to email everyone about the County Championships, National Club or their role in the British?

Apart from that, should the ECF be organising chess, or facilitating the organisation of chess?

How much chess is organised by Chess Scotland and the Welsh Chess Union?

[Phil Neatherway]

I also joined as a standard member for 3 years and I did receive the email. So it's nothing to do with that.

I cannot understand why anyone would regard this email as spam. Surely it is the sort of thing that the ECF has been criticised on this forum for NOT doing previously. The ECF Acting DoMM has already done more than his predecessor.

[David Pardoe]

Yes...and it organises teams for international events.
Its essentially concerned with framework issues, with an `umbrella` role to oversee chess in the UK...
Many facets to this... the encouragement and promotion of chess on all levels...

[Andrew Zigmond]

The latest E-mail from the ECF says a number of things

1. It passes on a deal from a seemingly fairly dubious business without first checking it out
2. It promises future benefits for members, but there is nothing actually there at present
3. It celebrates the fact that they have signed up 9000 members, i.e. they have taken a lot of money out of chess, but there is no talk of any chess actually being organised.

This is hardly a new approach from the ECF

I've followed the instructions provided as far as I can without actually buying tickets. As far as I can see everything seems to be in order - this is the official site for a major event and a 20% (£6) offer on tickets for such a major event seems very generous. If this is the shape of things to come then it seems a very positive step.

The candidates begin on Friday so the discount needed to be publicised now or else it would be too late. If the ECF had simply posted an announcement on their website (which I for one refer to very infrequently so would have missed it) there no doubt be mutterings about lack of publicity. This thread reminds me of the old quote about `You can please some of the people all of the time ...`

To Matthew Turner - with the greatest of respect (and I note you are not currently an ECF member at present) I would say you need to justify your `seemingly fairly dubious business` statement with evidence or else withdraw it.

[Matthew Turner]

Andrew,
Just look at the thread on the candidates and see the Agon are withdrawing from the future candidates events Lisbon, Madrid etc. You've got journalists from multiple mainstream newspapers, Malcolm Pein, Leonard Barden talking about problem with financing.

[Jonathan Bryant]

For information:
https://twitter.com/Times_Chess/status/ ... 8665440257

[Andrew Zigmond]

Andrew,
Just look at the thread on the candidates and see the Agon are withdrawing from the future candidates events Lisbon, Madrid etc. You've got journalists from multiple mainstream newspapers, Malcolm Pein, Leonard Barden talking about problem with financing.

Fair enough. I hadn't actually seen that thread. To be fair the London candidates will be going ahead no matter what and is still a major chess event on our shores. Having reread the ECF email it was never claimed that the offer was exclusive. I agree that there are question marks about what facilities will be available for spectators and if I was in a position to consider attending I would be seeking to find out before putting down money.

My original response was more to express annoyance that when the ECF tries to do something positive - and Sean warned it would not be an overnight task - the response is a tidal wave of negativity.

[Jonathan Bryant]

... the response is a tidal wave of negativity.

A tidal wave? Some unduly negative posts I agree. And some silly ones. Why anybody would expect to be reimbursed because they'd bought something at full price before a discount offer was available is beyond me. Perhaps these same people are approaching The Times chess correspondent with a similar demand.

On the whole, though, it seems to me that this thread has largely been supportive of Sean's email.

[Greg Breed]

I support it. It's one click (3 seconds maybe) to delete if you don't want it and 5 minutes to log in here and write a negative message on the forum!!
When the unsubscribe option is finalised hopefully the nayrsayers will shrivel away!

[Sean Hewitt]

When the unsubscribe option is finalised hopefully the nayrsayers will shrivel away!

Want a bet?!

[John Upham]

I have a query about the PSO renewal process and web site:

Today I successfully renewed my membership with little pain (following an auto generated reminder).

The site displays:

Upcoming events
Booked events



No information to display.

Whatever I do?

Do these links provide something useful for anyone else or is it just me as usual that it does not work for?

[William Metcalfe]

Roger you really do talk a load of tosh at times.My club has 5/6 new members this year and every one became a ECF member.They did not have to as we have lots of internal tornys that we do not send in for grading.But they wanted to join and feel like they were contributing to English chess.Also they comented how cheep membership was compaired to there other hobbies