Society memberships 2016 – 2017
What’s new for 2016 – 2017?
Union Cloud is continuing to evolve, and as well as removing transactions fees for events, we aim to have a system in place by September whereby you can keep a record of offline and online memberships in one place. You will just need to add any offline payments to the system.
Continuing on from 2015-2016, the following still apply:
1. Membership fees can be set by you - from £0+ you can set your own membership
2. There is still no minimum numbers of members required to form a group - the figure of 25 members is no longer compulsory. Groups do however need a minimum of a President, Secretary and Treasurer.
3. Offline and online memberships can be taken throughout the year (including during the Welcome Programme Fairs).
4. Recording your memberships (for offline and online members) – we’re providing tools to help you record your memberships more accurately. We will provide more information on keeping a joint record of online and offline members through Union Cloud once we have the information available.
Contents:
1. Membership fees
2. Minimum number of members required to be affiliated
3. Offline and online memberships
4. Recording your memberships
5. Action points
1. Membership fees
We recognise that some of our student groups do not necessarily require a membership and therefore we have removed the minimum you need to charge to your members i.e. groups can have free membership.
We have made this optional to empower you as a group as we understand that all of our groups are unique and have different needs e.g. some groups may need guaranteed income to run their events throughout the year whilst others don’t.
For the majority of our groups we do continue to recommend that you charge a minimum membership and we suggest £3 as it is both an affordable figure to the member and provides you with some foundational income to organise the events your members want.
Committee members must also pay the membership fee (if you’re charging one), they cannot be a member or on the committee if they have not paid the membership fee.
Sub-committee membership rates again can be free or chargeable; it is based on your assessment of the sub-committee’s needs.
Please note: the amount you charge your members is based on your calculations of your groups income needs – whilst we recommend £3, you can increase this charge to what you feel is both necessary and affordable.
2. Minimum number of members required to be affiliated
Similar to the fees, we have removed the minimum membership requirement of 25 members. Again we felt if you provide a fantastic and fulfilling society to 12 members, you shouldn’t have to struggle to make it up to the 25 mark.
In September 2016 we will be launching SAS – Student group Accreditation Scheme. Rather than the emphasis being on the number of members you have, SAS focuses on the output of your group. All groups will need to fulfil base level targets to be an affiliated ratified student group. Please keep an eye on our communications for news on SAS.
Please note: We do recommend that you aim for as many members as possible for both richness and diversity of your group and reaching out to more students. Again we would continue to suggest 25 as an ideal number for you to aim for, use last year’s total figure as a target and aim to increase this.
3. Offline and online memberships
3.1 Offline:
Cash memberships continue for 2016 – 2017
Societies can continue to take cash and cheque memberships at their tables during the Fairs. In order to do this you need to keep an accurate record of those that have signed up (this will inform part of your record for the year).
See 4. Recording your memberships (below) for the information around recording.
Cash and cheque memberships can be taken throughout the year following the same process. Ensure you’re prepared for people to turn up to events that might not have signed up and want to join (i.e. have your record with you so that you can get their details and add to it, as well as taking the money).
Cheques need to be made payable to LUSU and have your society name written on the back.
More details around cash handling and preparation for the welcome programme fairs will be sent out to groups in the ‘Welcome Programme Financial Management’ guide once stalls have been allocated.
3.2 Online:
This is the preferred method of members signing up for the following reasons:
· It automatically asks the questions and stores the information needed for each member,
· The payment is automatically processed in to your groups bank account,
· The record is an online record of your membership base generated automatically,
· You can email your members from your sub-site,
· It will automatically expire when their membership finishes,
· They can pay by card rather than cash.
Please ensure your Web Administrator has updated all of your memberships for this year. There are some very important specifics around setting expiry dates on your memberships – we’ve created a guide on our website here (for accuracy of information please ensure you read, understand and apply this guidance): here .
When a member signs up they will be listed as a member immediately, the funds will then be processed from Union Cloud and in your group bank account within 2 – 3 weeks of the payment.
4. Recording your memberships
All groups should be keeping a record of their members that combines the offline and online members. This is so that:
· You can have clear details on who is a member, their contact details, membership numbers, types,
· Have streamlined communications and access to all of your members (i.e. be able to email them),
· Provides you with a register that you can take to events (eliminating confidential information),
· Provide to Union Activities when requested,
· Have a record to provide to next year’s committee,
4.1 Confidentiality:
The information you hold on members is confidential. It may only be used for official student group business and may not be passed on for any other reason without the prior written consent of the members concerned.
Only committee members should have access to this information and only those committee members that require it.
4.2 Recording tools
You can download a membership record on the website to keep your own records of member sign ups, or with the updated Union Cloud system, it will be possible to add all offline sign ups onto your online member record. More information will be released on this once it has been finalised.
The record provides guidance notes for completion as well as examples.
· The first tab ‘Membership record’ should be used as your electronic record throughout the year.
· The second tab ‘Record to print for sign ups’ is for you to print off and have with you at both Welcome Programme Fairs and whenever you do an event that is open to potential new members so that you can take cash and sign them up on the day.
· You’ll then need to transfer the information from your new members that have signed up to your ‘Membership record’.
Please update this record regularly; we would suggest assigning a committee member to managing this process e.g. the Secretary of your group.
Submission of record – will be required by Monday 24th October at midday.
5. Action points
These are the action points needed for memberships:
No: / Action point / Completed:1. / Meet/communicate as a committee and discuss the membership figure to be set including sub-committee figures
2. / Ensure your website memberships are updated and accurate
3. / Download the ‘Memberships record’
4. / Print multiple copies of the ‘Record to print for sign ups’ from the above spreadsheet
Thanks for reading and working with us.
Please get in touch with us if you have any more questions that aren’t answered above via:
· Email:
· Phone: 0116 223 1182
· Come and see us!