April 2009 Council Meeting : Details

[John Upham]

It was disappointing that John Upham was unable to attend on this occasion to give an update on the Certificate of Merit. Were there any references made to the Cert of Merit and/or the Cert of Excellence.
Regards
Peter Turner
Officer in Charge of Certificate of Excellence

Peter and everyone else. I am very sorry I was unable to attend the meeting today. I will, this weekend post to this forum my intended presentation in Microsoft (apologies for swearing ) Powerpoint format. That is, if the forum config will allow this. I tried to post an eXcel formatted file the other day and phpBB barfed most annoyingly.

I fear that had I attended I may have been unable to contain my frustration at what Sean has reported and made robust comments which may, in turn, have offended some of the more senior citizens on ECF Council.

I will post the ppt document to CM first as a matter of courtesy as I know he was disappointed at my non-attendance.

[Peter Turner]

Evening John
Appologies certainly not required, you had let us know that you were not able to attend. I had just wondered if, in your absense, anyone had made any comments about the two schemes. Apart from all the potential benefits to youngsters from the CofM it is also hopefully going to be a considerable income stream to support junior chess, rather than the distribution of sets which is likely to be at some cost to the ECF.
Cheers
Peter T

[Sean Hewitt]

Evening Sean, oh how I miss those meetings!! Your quick report much appreciated. It was disappointing that John Upham was unable to attend on this occasion to give an update on the Certificate of Merit. Were there any references made to the Cert of Merit and/or the Cert of Excellence.
Regards
Peter Turner
Officer in Charge of Certificate of Excellence

There were indeed references made. I think it would be fairest to let John Upham update eveyone with the current status of the project, as it is his 'baby' so to speak.

[Sean Hewitt]

Sean, nice to have some (possibly) better news from Chris about the chess sets. Were there any specific details about delivery dates, costings, distribution etc. and should we be looking forward to an update of the ECF website home page?
Cheers

Yes there were specifics about dates / costings / distribution etc. However [fearful no doubt of previous jumpings of the gun] we were told these in confidence, and asked to respect that. We were told that there would be a statement on the website in due course, once it had been agreed with Holloid ; which seems reasonable to me.

I can tell you that Chris Majer was most convincing in his conviction that this would all happen. Indeed, he staked his own reputation and position as CEO on it. I am sure that he did not do this lightly and whilst nothing is ever certain I think it's all looking positive on the chess for schools front.

[Carl Hibbard]

Peter and everyone else. I am very sorry I was unable to attend the meeting today. I will, this weekend post to this forum my intended presentation is Microsoft (apologies for swearing ) Powerpoint format. This is, if the forum config will allow this. I tried to post an eXcel formatted file the other day and phpBB barfed most annoyingly.

Drop me the file and I will of course deal with it

[Carl Hibbard]

Evening Sean, oh how I miss those meetings!! Your quick report much appreciated. It was disappointing that John Upham was unable to attend on this occasion to give an update on the Certificate of Merit. Were there any references made to the Cert of Merit and/or the Cert of Excellence.

Regards
Peter Turner
Officer in Charge of Certificate of Excellence

There were indeed references made. I think it would be fairest to let John Upham update eveyone with the current status of the project, as it is his 'baby' so to speak.

If I am honest I never liked the way the "project" was awarded - was there ever any invitation to tender on this one John?

[John Upham]

If I am honest I never liked the way the "project" was awarded - was there ever any invitation to tender on this one John?

It is not appropriate for me to comment on this as this precise matter has has been previously discussed : it wasn't my decision, honest Guv!

Also, I don't want to reveal how cheap I am! My agency would spit blood if they knew!

I'm sure you would have done it for half the price in a tenth of the time....

[Carl Hibbard]

I'm sure you would have done it for half the price in a tenth of the time....

As you know I work for free and would not have been interesting in taking on the work anyway

[John Upham]

I'm sure you would have done it for half the price in a tenth of the time....

As you know I work for free and would not have been interesting in taking on the work anyway

I was joking so no offence was intended!

[Carl Hibbard]

They further think it sensible in these trying economic times to increase the amount of money spent at or by the office from the already massive £118,000 per year.

That does seem a lot, does that ever get slightly broken down a bit into more details?

[John Philpott]

Carl Hibbard wrote

That does seem a lot, does that ever get slightly broken down a bit into more details?

The figures do get analysed in a fair amount of detail in the budget papers presented to Council. If the particular £118,000 that Sean referred to is the £118,808 2008/9 gross management services forecast per page 7 of the forecast/budget document circulated to delegates in advance of yesterday's meeting, this breaks down as follows:

Salaries - office staff 77,000
CRB - 200
Printing and stationery - 1,800
Photocopying - 1,000
Depreciation 1,500
Equipment and software repairs and renewals - 2,500
Postage 3,000
Telecommunications - 1,500
Internet and website expenses - 762
Rent, rates and electricity - 8,400
Office sundry expenses - 1,000
Board, Council and other expenses - 5,000
President/CEO - 1,500
Insurance - 2,928
Bank charges - 1,600
Credit card charges - 1,600
Audit and accountancy fee - 1,800
Yearbook - printing and other direct costs - 4,318
Purchases - books and equipment - 1,400
Total - 118,808

In relation to these figures I would point out.

1. It is not entirely accurate to regard all these costs as being spent at or by the Office - management services picks up all costs (e.g. President/CEO) that do not fall into any other budget.

2. These represent gross expenses, and in some cases there is related income: for example, the Yearbook expenditure is offset by income of 4,800 and purchases by sales of 1,700.

3. Even after you adjust for 1 and 2, what remains is rather a large figure.

[Leonard Barden]

What is the amount of the government grant to the ECF?

[John Philpott]

Leonard Barden asked

What is the amount of the government grant to the ECF?

£60,000 pa

[benedgell]

[quote][/quote] think that it will all be ok if they put up the cost of membership massively (by up to 25% for standard members) and put up game fee by twice the rate of inflation (6%).
Not saying I have any more business sense then the people who came up with this, but one would assume that putting game fees and membership fees up by large amounts during a recession would just cause people to enter less tournaments, and less teams entered into local leagues.

[Ben Purton]

Ben Maynard Edgell suggesting that increasing G to push up ad does not increase chess growth ........Probaly because chess isnt quite big enough to fit under the macro-scope.

ben