How does your club deal with new comers?

[estelle]

To avoid misunderstandings, as I understand it, BCA Temporary Membership works as follows:

Temporary BCA Membership is a gift available to all BCA Member Clubs who take their insurance through BCA. It allows an unlimited number of people to be gifted 17 days' temporary BCA membership (and therefore insurance). The Club is required to keep a record of the person's details, but no longer needs to forward these details to BCA (this needs updating on the FAQs). Each individual is limited to one period of temporary membership.

Damian Weare
(BCA Secretary)

thank you for clarifying.
I guess that if clubs are to be 'arse covering', when a newbie 'officially approaches a club' looking to go caving, they will need to look at how they work with the temporary membership and promptly follow up with maybe some sort of probational membership or process an application very quickly! I suspect a fair number of newbies will be approaching 'a mate who caves' and getting their first few tasters that way and therefore won't be deemed to be under club auspices so it's up to individual(s) taking them then, as i suspect we all cave at times with people who aren't members of any caving club or have BCA or any other PL insurance and don't tend to let it bother us... 

 

[kay]

To avoid misunderstandings, as I understand it, BCA Temporary Membership works as follows:

Temporary BCA Membership is a gift available to all BCA Member Clubs who take their insurance through BCA. It allows an unlimited number of people to be gifted 17 days' temporary BCA membership (and therefore insurance). The Club is required to keep a record of the person's details, but no longer needs to forward these details to BCA (this needs updating on the FAQs). Each individual is limited to one period of temporary membership.

Damian Weare
(BCA Secretary)

At least one club requires the prospective provisional member to have attended a  number of trips with club members. In theory, the 17 day period allows three consecutive weekends. But in practice, the potential member may not want to or be able to cave three weekends on the trot. Have any club worked a way round this, other than dropping the requirement for the prospective member to have done several trips with them?

 

[martinb]

To avoid misunderstandings, as I understand it, BCA Temporary Membership works as follows:

Temporary BCA Membership is a gift available to all BCA Member Clubs who take their insurance through BCA. It allows an unlimited number of people to be gifted 17 days' temporary BCA membership (and therefore insurance). The Club is required to keep a record of the person's details, but no longer needs to forward these details to BCA (this needs updating on the FAQs). Each individual is limited to one period of temporary membership.

Damian Weare
(BCA Secretary)

thank you for clarifying.
I guess that if clubs are to be 'arse covering', when a newbie 'officially approaches a club' looking to go caving, they will need to look at how they work with the temporary membership and promptly follow up with maybe some sort of probational membership or process an application very quickly! I suspect a fair number of newbies will be approaching 'a mate who caves' and getting their first few tasters that way and therefore won't be deemed to be under club auspices so it's up to individual(s) taking them then, as i suspect we all cave at times with people who aren't members of any caving club or have BCA or any other PL insurance and don't tend to let it bother us... 

Interesting, I didn't know about the BCA scheme covering 17 days.

We had a committee meeting a month or so ago about this very subject. As a club, we have experienced a 100% increase in members over the last 2 years and almost 300% increase since 2007/8. 

I would estimate that a good 15%+ of our membership are new to caving in that time, and whilst wanting to encourage new comers, we don't want to be left open to problems if people are caving without insurance.  :read:

The big bugbear with the temporary 17 days is to get 2 or 3 trips in that time, not all of us can get every weekend - we have real lives as well! - if it was, say 28 or even 31 days that might be more feasable?  :-\

As a club we have since decided that full membership (of the club and BCA Insurance) is a prerequisite prior to any caving. If they like caving, all well and good, otherwise, sorry guys, but its cheap in comparison to paying full whack for a couple of caving trips with providers.

 

[paul]

To avoid misunderstandings, as I understand it, BCA Temporary Membership works as follows:

Temporary BCA Membership is a gift available to all BCA Member Clubs who take their insurance through BCA. It allows an unlimited number of people to be gifted 17 days' temporary BCA membership (and therefore insurance). The Club is required to keep a record of the person's details, but no longer needs to forward these details to BCA (this needs updating on the FAQs). Each individual is limited to one period of temporary membership.

Damian Weare
(BCA Secretary)

At least one club requires the prospective provisional member to have attended a  number of trips with club members. In theory, the 17 day period allows three consecutive weekends. But in practice, the potential member may not want to or be able to cave three weekends on the trot. Have any club worked a way round this, other than dropping the requirement for the prospective member to have done several trips with them?

We have new members who are already experienced cavers, who have maybe moved into the area or whatever. They can join the club as Prospective Members. As Prospective Members, they have all the benefits of Full Members (use of Club gear, Members rates for hut usage, Library, newsletter, etc. but cannot vote at meetings. To become a Prospective Member, they just have to fill in a form and pay the annual subscription plus payment for BCA insurance if they are bot already covered as DIM or as membership of another club. After 12 months as Prospective Member, they can apply for Full Membership is thay have fulfilled the requirements.

For newcomers who maybe want to give caving a go, for their first caving trip they will be covered by Temporary BCA membership as above. Sometimes they are able to get underground again within the 17 days or sometimes not. Either way, they usually decide after the first trip whether caving is for them or not. It doesn't usually matter if they manage a further trip within the 17 days.

If they wish to carry on, we offer the same Prospective Membership  as above, so they are then covered by BCA insurance.
Even though the Temporary BCA Membership covers a 17 day period, it seems beter to think of it as insurance for the first try out trip underground, then for any future trips, they must join as Prospective Members. This hasn't caused any issues so far.

 

[kay]

For newcomers who maybe want to give caving a go, for their first caving trip they will be covered by Temporary BCA membership as above. Sometimes they are able to get underground again within the 17 days or sometimes not. Either way, they usually decide after the first trip whether caving is for them or not. It doesn't usually matter if they manage a further trip within the 17 days.

If they wish to carry on, we offer the same Prospective Membership  as above, so they are then covered by BCA insurance.
Even though the Temporary BCA Membership covers a 17 day period, it seems beter to think of it as insurance for the first try out trip underground, then for any future trips, they must join as Prospective Members. This hasn't caused any issues so far.

Yeah, that works. What I was thinking about when I posted was this: for one of the clubs I belong to, the application form for provisional membership requires you to list 3 trips with the club that you have been on - which is difficult, if you've only got 17 days worth of insurance to do it in. (Not a problem for me, since I'm a DIM anyway)