BOF surcharge?

[andypat]

I'm in the process of trying to determine entry fees for our Erskine Nopesport Urban League event on 2 April.
Its a level C event under the new scheme, so attracts ranking points.

I cant figure out if we should be charging non BOF members an additional £2. Anyone able to interpret the AGM guidance for this? As far as I can see the guidance for doing this applied to the old 3 tier structure rather than the new 4 tier one and I cant find anything to clarify this on the neww website.

I'm inclined not to bother unless someone (or BOF) can provide something to clarify as I'm not sure its clear enough at present, and I cant find any other similar events to comapre with on any of the online entry portals. (Edinburgh is down as level D for some reason which I assume counts as local)

[Clive Coles]

I believe in the absence of any newly published rules or guidance we have to assume the £2 surcharge is still in operation. The new BOF web site fees page for what I think must be your event seems to confirm this.

http://www.britishorienteering.org.uk/index.php?pg=80&action=fees&id=59190

Our club are certainly going to allow discounts for level C events though we will disregard the surcharge for many smaller level D events where we charge a flat £1 (50p for Juniors) to just cover our map printing costs.

i guess in time we will be told if we are moving to the practice of displaying BOF member fees on the web site rather than the fees to be charged to Jo Public. I wasn't at the last BOF AGM but didn't they debate a motion advocating we move to surcharging non-members ?

[greywolf]

The new BOF web site fees page for what I think must be your event seems to confirm this.

Why would you take any notice of this? - it's default text which appears for all events, regardless of event level or entry fee structure. But more pertinently, how the hell is anyone supposed to know?

The combination of repeated restructuring, bodged (or sabotaged) implementation and inadequate IT has left an almightly shambles - rather than bringing convergence we have inconsistency and randomness: Edinburgh, despite being important enough for the Masters Cup (and the NUL) is registered as a "local" event at level D, with no BOF member discount offered and presumably no ranking points available; whilst the next day BOK have an event advertised as "local" but registered at Level C...it even has a Red course, which will be a novelty, given that they disappeared from the planner's palette a year ago...

[edit: and yes i know that having good events is the most important thing...]

[Clive Coles]

I think you are being a bit hard on your Association and Club fixtures secretaries. It is they who have to sort out which events will be moved from level D to level C and those which move from level C to level B.

The new computer facilities they have been given are not yet fully functional ~ with some trepidation some ugrades have been applied successfully. Other attempts have encountered problems.

But these guys, and BOF staff, had had a few days off with their families over Christmas. So they should.

So...be patient ~ these anomolies will get sorted.

[Highlander]

Clive is right things will get sorted. The edinburgh race will be changing its level at the start of the year.
Organiser edinburgh city race

[Paul Frost]

From the 2010 AGM minutes:

Proposal 8: Differential event entry fees for British Orienteering members.

There being no questions, the meeting agreed to vote on the differential event entry fees for British Orienteering members
The proposed differential event entry fees were accepted by a vote.

Voting (by ballot and including proxies):
For 505 - 93.2% Against 37 - 6.8% Abstentions 39


Proposal 9: The differential entry fee is publicised as an extra charge for non- members.

The differential fee be publicised by showing as an entry fee for British Orienteering members with the extra charge for non-members being indicated eg “£6 to qualifying members of British Orienteering (£8 to others)”.
Proposed: Lyn West (SOS) Seconded: John Woodall (NOC)
There being no questions, the meeting agreed to vote on the differential event entry fees being publicised as an extra charge for non-members.
The proposed publicity of event entry fees was accepted by a vote. Voting (by ballot and including proxies):
For 489 - 91.2% Against 47 - 8.8% Abstentions 47

And from memory the previous year had agreed that the £2 charge applied to ALL levels of event in 2010. So there is not really any ambiguity about when/if/what to charge

I've always been slightly puzzled at the hostility to the £2 charge. The only people that benefited from the charge was the club, as none of the money had to be sent to anybody, it was pure profit for the clubs.

[SJC]

Proposal 8: Differential event entry fees for British Orienteering members
It is proposed that the current provision for a £2 reduction in the event entry fee for qualifying senior members
of British Orienteering at National (Level 1), Regional (Level 2) and Local (Level 3) events should be changed
so that the reduction remains mandatory at National and Regional events, but that at Local (Level 3) events,
clubs should decide what reduction (if any) is appropriate.

Which, although approved, is ambiguous with regard to the four levels.

[Clive Coles]

Thanks for that clarification Paul ~ clearly we should be moving to a surcharging system sometime in the future .

Currently however fees recorded on the BOF web site expect Discounts to be applied at all levels. This was also the case with 3-tiers.

I understand however there are a number of further software changes in the pipeline awaiting release. Perhaps the switch to Surcharging , and the non-manditory application of a differential at level D will be two of them.

For the time being I take the view we need to continue to express fees on the BOF website as the public non-member rate ( i.e £2 BOF senior member discount will be allowed where appropriate).

[AndyO]

Paul, the hostility to the surcharge from some quarters is precisely because the profit goes to the clubs. There is no extra cost for registration or affiliation to justify the extra (other than manual entry to the computer system for the race), and it discriminates against non members when many clubs are trying to attract newcomers including runners to the sport. Some clubs (notably INVOC) have taken a decision to forego this "profit" and not apply the surcharge. I don't suppose they have had any cause to regret the decision or felt under any pressure to change this policy.

The fact that it is up to the clubs of course is the reason for the anomalies and any inconsistency.

andypat, the answer is that the £2 additional charge is in operation, but it's up to the clubs to decide whether to impose it or not.

[andypat]

Thanks for the update guys. I think I understand things a little better, and releived to see I'm not the only one confused by this. My problem was as I couldnt find the right info on the website via the drop dopwns, I searched and got a variety of different advice depending on which document I read. NOt the fault of the website, more that different docs saved on the website give different info, more the fault of the frequent changes in procedure - how do you know you have the up to date info?

I'll see whether Clyde are feeling generous towards newcomers or not before I put the event on oentries.

[greywolf]

Glad to hear that the Edinburgh event will be reregistered... thanks

Not at all convinced that many of the other issues will get sorted quite so quickly...the surcharge / discount being a case in point. If it's mandatory at all events then maybe the clubs ought to be told (it was only voted on 8 months ago, after all) If it really is up to the clubs to decide, then do they have the power to remove the misleading default text from the BOF website when they aren't going to implement the full surcharge?

so for example, just on the remotest off-chance that the BOF website fixtures list might actually be used by a relative newcomer, what would they expect to pay at:
http://www.britishorienteering.org.uk/i ... s&id=59299

[Clive Coles]

do they have the power to remove the misleading default text from the BOF website when they aren't going to implement the full surcharge?

The simple answer is ... No they don't. The text you currently see has been on the web page since the outset of the previous web design. That is why some clubs have utilised the Parking Information field to qualify ( or possibly confuse) the fees being charged. An act of desparation by clubs to try to overcome an inflexible system.

I opposed this fixed text at the time and was effectively told to shut up. The issue had been discussed by the BOF Board and the statement at the head of the web page. reflected their decision. It could only be revoked by an AGM motion.

We now appear to have an AGM vote in favour of some flexibility in regard to the differental at level D events ~ as yet however this change has not been introduced to the new web site.

I do however still expect this change to be made sometime. Just at the moment however there are some more pressing problems with the fixtures maintenance facilities that are being addressed with greater urgency.

When the move is made I expect another period of confusion as I suspect club fixture secretaries will be required to adjust any fees they have set up for future events.

[lindseyk]

Was the main thrust of the £2 discount not an effort to get people to actually join a club, thereby helping BOF with their various targets to get funding. Unless newcomers are wanting to travel further afield to bigger events, without a tangible reason to join why would people bother when they can turn up and run the same as BOF members ? It would be interesting to know how club membership has changed, if at all, for those clubs/areas who don't charge a differential. There's a similer system in Scottish Athletics and I used to get peeved when event organisers didn't charge non-members the extra £2 - as a result I don't join anymore, which is cheaper for me over a year.

[Paul Frost]

From a previous post about the £2 charge:

We had reservations about it but decided that it might be a good thing in the long run.
We used to charge £4, so we raised the fees to £5 and applied the discount. This gave an incentive for people to join BOF and the more casual participant contributes more than the regular. Given that most regulars often help out at events and casuals don't, that seems reasonable.

The result was that our membership level soared and it seems to have also made them more committed, so we also have much larger numbers travelling to events outside our area. The club bond is also much stronger now than ever before and this has led to 50+ attending our first coaching weekend away.

We don't charge any club membership fee and have always thought that event income was a better way to fund the club.

In 2008 EckO probably had about 15 BOF registered members, we now have 61, and most of those are now past their free period and have actually paid to be a member.

Another example of why free isn't always good.
In Scotland it has been common practise not to charge a hire fee for SI cards, thus not much incentive to buy your own card.
The problem with this is that when it comes to producing results someone needs to type in all the entrants details into the results software. If they had their own card it would be done automatically and save a lot of time.
It looks likely that Scotland will soon encourage clubs to charge for the loan of a card and so encourage ownership and this will reduce the workload on volunteers at event registration etc. The Scottish 6 Days has always charged a fee, and with the event coming to EckOland in August I emailed members with information about why they might want to buy an SI card, we have sold 20 so far!

As lindseyk points out, if there is no incentive to join, why would you.

I should add that I don't agree or like the current membership structure and think it should be reduced to a single flat fee of about £10 with no split of local/national. Then increase the levies to make up the shortfall of the income needed to administer/manage the sports national body and regional associations.

[Clive Coles]

I also don't agree with the current membership structure which has a differential between local & national members. I mention this even though I am in fact now a local BOF member. I switched to becoming a local member when I realised I rarely travelled outside my Regional Association boundaries. Where I did venture abroad I was content to pay the additional £2.

I would favour a flat BOF membership fee for everyone (happy with the £10 suggested by Paul) and an increase of event levy to ensure the change is at least financially neutral in regard to BOF's income.

An interesting approach Paul, to Club membership fees ~ obviously paid off.

I think it is becoming more acceptable to raise income by participation rather than through membership fees. We in East Anglia dropped a Regional Association membership fee some time ago