From: Andy
& Wendy Leslie
Sent: 25 November 2006 14:46
To: 'aharrison@englandathletics.org'
Cc: 'cbenning@englandathletics.org'
Subject: RE: England Athletics Affiliation
Dear
Alan,
Thank
you for taking the time to reply. I understand that, as Chief Exec, you’re
busy and I appreciate you making the effort.
I
have written to address these issues with you as I think that you should be
aware of the impact to clubs such as ours – the view from the bottom is less
clear than that from the top! This feedback is directly generated by your
letter of 20th October.
Remember,
we’re not a T&F club. We see none of the T&F
benefits that accrue from
Sorry,
but saying that our fees should go up because they’re
already higher in the North & Midlands etc is invalid. If you are propounding
the view that we were actually subsidised by clubs in those areas, I find this
difficult to believe without a breakdown of insurance costs. The SEAA has still
got vast amounts of money sitting in bank accounts, which surely would have
been used up were we truly under-contributing. Insurance is the most obvious
tangible benefit of affiliation that we are aware of. If the subsidy argument
is explicitly put forward, given the numbers of runners in the south, I’d think that fees in the North & Midlands should go
down somewhat when this scheme is implemented. Is that the case?
Here’s
some detailed input on the impact of this new system.
Impact upon events of the new fees
We
organise the Yateley 10K Races, a highly successful 3-race series in the summer
months with over 1000 entrants for each race. So let’s take these as a
worked example. On the entry forms, we ask if the runner belongs to an
affiliated club. It seems that we will now have to ask if the runner is
registered as affiliated as well as the club. I hope you realise that it’s
already difficult to confirm if any club quoted on the entry form is
affiliated, and now it’ll be impossible to know if the runner is, either.
Worse still, he could be running for his second / third claim club which isn’t
affiliated, but he is, as an individual, with another club. What do we do then?
This
level of complexity is going to get us hopelessly entangled and will not be
viable.
Impact upon road running clubs and their members
Let
us say that Joe Bloggs is a typical member of our
club. At present he pays £15 per annum to join up as a member and gets all the
benefits of running with like-minded people and – very important to some -
saves £2 in unaffiliated fees every race. He already has to enter 8 races or
more in a year, to save money – but of course he gets tangible benefits from
the club (such as a Newsletter, organised social and race-related activities,
etc.), so he remains a member. This hike in fees means he will pay an extra £3
in 2007/8 and £5 per annum from April 1 2008. So he now only saves money if he
runs more than 9 races in 2007/8 and more than 10 in 2008/9. He can take one of
three decisions:
Option 1 is obviously desirable; however our Committee
has to be able to point out what he gets for the money. I note that your email
doesn’t point to any additional applicable benefits for the additional
money. This is a fundamental problem. In my first email I pointed out
that, when we get to our AGM, you are asking the Committee to stand up and defend
this increase in fees when we cannot point to any additional benefit. When was
the last time you went into Tesco, gave them your
money and left without anything in your shopping bags? If they put the price of
a can of beans up by 300%, with no corresponding increase in quality or
quantity, would you buy them? I think not.
Option 2 will lose us members. There’s a financial
tipping point for the decision to join or leave a club and some will feel this
increase is it, especially when we cannot point to any additional tangible
benefit that they will see as a result.
Option 3 may be described as dishonest, but hey, this is
the real world. Unless we turn into the Race Police - and I assure you no Club
Official wants to be seen in that light - we have no way of knowing what a
member puts on a race entry form. Many people join and in the first year say
they doubt they’ll run in races as yet. If they change their mind halfway
through the year, Club Officials are the people who have to immediately demand
more money on your behalf.
Ours,
like 99% of road running clubs, is run by a small number of dedicated people
who perform their duties in their spare time. We are not professionals, paid
for our duties. We spend hundreds of hours a year already with running the club
and associated events. We don’t need more work piled upon us from above.
We
affiliated to save on race fees for our members and to be part of the great
road running adventure sweeping our country in 1987.
As
a road running club, we see very little from
As
you suggested, I have cc’d the Interim
Sub-Regional Manager for our area, Chris Benning. I
have attached my original email and your reply in order that she can follow the
conversation.
To
summarise, if you want clubs such as ours “on side”, I believe that
I hope, that as a result
of these emails, you and those involved with this decision will revisit it with
consideration taken of retaining the loyalty of affiliated non-T&F clubs.
Please feel free to
continue this conversation or hand it on to Chris Benning.
Best regards,
Andy Leslie
Publicity Secretary,
E:
Publicity@sandhurstjoggers.org.uk
W:
www.SandhurstJoggers.Org.UK
H:
01344 772894
M:
07976 209330