English Chess Forum

https://www.englishchess.org.uk/current ... angements/

Thanks to the ECF Directors and Managers for stepping up.

In years to come, people will look at the day and the month of this announcement and wonder whether it was a spoof. Then they will look at the year and realise that it wasn't.

So why were the ECF Office staff furloughed? Am I missing something obvious?

English chess is obviously largely on hold due to the lockdown so there will be limited work for the ECF office to actually do. For example, as leagues are inactive there won't be any new players taking out memberships who have to be processed and the directors don't need any secretarial support. Also we don't know the specific circumstances of the office staff and whether any of them need to self isolate (and HR issues like that aren't our business anyway).

The bottom line is that the ECF continues to pay the office staff to do minimal work out of membership funded income (that will likely be less this year) or the office is simply closed and the staff presumably rely on the government's furlough scheme. Given that most people scream the house down about how much of ECF members money goes on administration it seems the best option - although perhaps not for the staff who are reliant on the ECF for an income.

I wonder how many ECF members will renew their membership in September

Mick Norris wrote: ↑

Mon Apr 27, 2020 9:07 pm

I wonder how many ECF members will renew their membership in September

Obviously it will depend on how back to normal we are, relatively speaking. We will have lost some players to the outbreak and others will perhaps be choosing to self isolate, however there will be some who are raring to go.

If chess activity is still prevented from taking place due to social distancing rules then there will be little point in renewing for some people. However that is not the fault of the ECF. Neither is the fact that some members might not have got their money's worth this year.

Andrew Zigmond wrote: ↑

Mon Apr 27, 2020 10:00 pm

Mick Norris wrote: ↑

Mon Apr 27, 2020 9:07 pm

I wonder how many ECF members will renew their membership in September

Obviously it will depend on how back to normal we are, relatively speaking. We will have lost some players to the outbreak and others will perhaps be choosing to self isolate, however there will be some who are raring to go.

If chess activity is still prevented from taking place due to social distancing rules then there will be little point in renewing for some people. However that is not the fault of the ECF. Neither is the fact that some members might not have got their money's worth this year.

However, it is to be hoped that many ECF members would renew as a gesture of support for chess in general and for the admin. staff in particular. It's only about the price of half a tank of petrol spread over one year.

Certainly I know a golf club where many members have renewed their April annual subscriptions despite there being little prospect of normal play being resumed yet.

I am piloting a series of online tournaments and one of the conditions of participation is that you are an ECF member or a supporter. Games will be graded by the ECF on a new list dedicated to online events. All players must be on camera throughout their games and play under their real names. We have had some success with this and the feedback has been really good.

Right now we need all players to keep engaging with organisations like the ECF, CSC, 4NCL and 2020chess as they are leading the way for all of us in this difficult time. They are putting hundreds of mainly unpaid hours into thinking about how to give us a service that goes some way to replicate the over the board experience. I hope that everyone will renew their memberships, and that online national team, individual and club events thrive. The point is that even when we are back playing chess face to face, this will have improved online competition, and therefore all competition, immensely.

I have learned more about chess online in the last few weeks than I ever wanted to

Adam Raoof wrote: ↑

Wed Apr 29, 2020 11:53 am

I have learned more about chess online in the last few weeks than I ever wanted to

Ain't that the truth!

Regardless of how hard the finances of the ECF are hit, I hope they still decide to keep the free silver junior membership of the ECF to any junior that has not being a previous member of the ECF, for the first year. That has been really useful for some of my club members in previous years, and I hope it continues.

(Of course one could suggest that the ECF will in the long term gain by offering the free junior silver membership anyway.)

I think that current membership ought to be Free until 31/12/20 compensating for the missing chess.

How are you going to finance 3 months free membership?

I do not think it is that difficult to save money and reduce membership fees

• There is a big saving in employment costs thanks to Furloughing
• The lack of international chess frees up large sums of money
• We move expenditure back to the levels of2-3 years ago. In the current climate for example it is not sensible to pay someone tasked to increase membership

The current climate is a lot more people watching and playing chess.

We pay other subs to watch chess not the Ecf. And I agree with Harry it is easy if the savings were applied.

Nick Grey wrote: ↑

Fri May 01, 2020 8:37 pm

I think that current membership ought to be Free until 31/12/20 compensating for the missing chess.

It's hardly the fault of the ECF that people are currently prevented from playing chess. And at the start of the pandemic people such as myself who were calling for a `business as usual` approach (wrongly - I appreciate that now) were widely criticised.

The ECF membership year runs from 1st September to 31st August every year with memberships backdating no matter when they were taken out. So under your proposal either the membership year runs from 1st January going forward or memberships simply backdate to September when paid making no difference at all.

I paid £39 for my gold membership this year. If I've lost a third of my season I could claim the ECF owes me £13 if I wanted to be petty. However I have no intention of taking that attitude.