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Spokes membership

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  1. chdot
    Admin

    An interesting discussion developed on another thread yesterday.

    One person was put off from posting a membership form because they weren't sure if they wanted to tick any of the 'volunteering boxes'.

    CCE Forum member DdF has posted this -

    "Probably the majority of Spokes members don't tick any of the boxes - most are members to receive information. We are very happy to have that type of member, but we very much hope they will act on info we send if they feel strongly about it (and we know from feedback that many do)."

    Full details of membership are here -

    http://www.spokes.org.uk/wordpress/membership

    It includes a PDF version of the membership form. BUT this has to be physically printed out and posted!

    It shouldn't be too difficult to produce an editable version and/or a Word doc.

    Posted 14 years ago #

  2. SRD
    Moderator

    Actually if you have capacity to fill in text on a PDF (may need non-free version) they will accept an emailed in form. But as you say, why not a word form, or a 'fillable' pdf? I may actually be able to do this, I'll have a try in my 'free' time :)

    Posted 14 years ago #

  3. SRD
    Moderator

    Nope. I don't have adobe professional (which lets you make forms), just standard. But you can fill in pdfs like this using 'typewriter' which is a bit fiddly, but do-able. I've been using googledocs a lot to collect data - it loads entries into a spreadsheet. Would think Spokes could rig up something like that quite easily.

    Posted 14 years ago #

  4. DdF
    Member

    The problem with online joining is not primarily the form.

    At the moment the Spokes website can't accept payments, and as we rely heavily on member donations that makes joining online or by email a problem. Donations are voluntary, but probably 95%+ of members do donate, and we couldn't survive without that.

    We are looking into online payment, but the website hosting is changing shortly which is the immediate priority.

    Then there is a debate amongst the relevant people in Spokes as to whether the online donation/payment system should be through paypal (very universal) or JustGiving (less well known, and can only be used for donations, not sales etc, but high ethical standards and the option of Gift Aid if Spokes becomes a charity - something which didn't used to be possible but apparently may now be, thanks to legislation changes). Maybe should have both?

    Posted 14 years ago #

  5. chdot
    Admin

    They are more upfront about soliciting money in New York!

    https://www.transalt.org/support/join

    Posted 14 years ago #

  6. SRD
    Moderator

    I've used both Paypal and JustGiving. i think the crucial thing is to set something up. Funny though, I had no impression from the membership form that donations were particularly wanted/needed (they're not mentioned) in contrast to what seemed like quite a heavy hand soliciting 'in kind' contributions.

    Posted 14 years ago #

  7. Anonymous

    An easy solution used by some (e.g. Resonance FM ) is just to post the bank account details of the relavant organisation online. Then I can simply transfer my small donation directly using online banking.

    A bit of hassle, but less so than printing out a form... and searching for a chequebook. In fact, my most recent attempt to join Spokes stalled when I couldn't find my chequebook (last used 2006 maybe?) I suppose I felt obliged to volunteer either some time or a donation.

    Either Paypal or JustGiving (which I think has become very well known over the last year, at least in my circles) would also be fine setting up donations.

    Posted 14 years ago #

  8. spytfyre
    Member

    >SRD
    This process works for me every time:
    convert the PDF to word: http://www.pdftoword.com/
    Then print it back to a PDF again: http://www.cutepdf.com/

    Bob's your uncle

    Posted 14 years ago #

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