For all other infomation relating to the Membership Secretaires please see the Secretaries Volunteer Role page
Membership Services Update for 2nd September 2009
We are beginning to see some benefits of the restructuring that has taken place in the Membership Service Department in recent months. Although the department is not yet fully staffed, we have made considerable efforts in reducing the response times for processing membership subscriptions.
We are now focusing our efforts on reducing the backlogs of email enquires received in membership. We have made some headway already and you should expect to see further improvements in response times in the coming weeks.
Membership Subscription Fees
Membership subscription fees will be increasing from the 1st October, we appreciate that any increase is a concern to members. However, although overheads for the charity have risen, members have benefited from static subscription fees for the past two years, as the Ramblers membership rates have not seen an increase since 2007.
The Board of Trustees have therefore decided that it was necessary for a slight increase to cover increasing costs over the past two years.
The new rates and categories are as follows:
Individual Membership £29.50
Joint Membership £39.50
Life Membership £650 (or £325 if aged 60 or over)
Joint Life Membership £775 (or £400 if both members are aged 60 or over)
Individual Concessionary* £17.50
Joint Concessionary* £23.50
Affiliated Club £40.50
*Concessionary rates will be available for students, people on means tested benefits or solely reliant on the state pension. These rates do not apply to overseas members.
We are in the process of producing a new recruitment leaflet valid from 1st October 2009. Beginning in the last week of September, we will send new leaflets to Area Publicity Officers (or Area Secretaries where there is no Area Publicity Officer), Area Recruitment Contacts, Group Secretaries, Group Publicity Officers, Group Recruitment Contacts.
To order additional copies of the leaflet, contact publicity@ramblers.org.uk or call 020 7339 8500.
1. Monthly Membership Reports
We continue to work on developing the new and improved monthly membership reports; unfortunately we have been unable to meet the August deadline proposed in the previous CRM updates.
We are committed to supplying accurate information in these reports and hope to have a revised time line for you as soon as possible.
2. Email Responses
We are currently processing emails received in Membership Services from the beginning of August.
As indicated in the previous CRM update, we have been concentrating our efforts on updating individual requests from members who asked for changes in their area and group affiliation and/or addresses to ensure the information we do provide is as accurate as possible. We are now processing all emails regardless of their subject matter from the above date.
3. New Membership Applications
We are currently processing membership applications types from the following dates;
- New Members cheque – 29th August
- New Members Direct Debits – 25st August
- Renewal Chq applications – 21st August
- Renewal Direct Debits applications - 17th August
4. Tesco Vouchers
Following further discussions with Tesco as of the beginning of September we are accepting Tesco vouchers as a method of payment for renewal membership. The success of this promotion will be monitored in the coming months and a full review in the new year.
