Land access fees are increasing significantly. There have already been increases in the Forestry England fees. Because of new environmental restrictions on the use of FE land (e.g. longer periods when no access is available because of nesting birds) the club has had to make more use of privately-owned land, which generally has higher access charges. There have been mapping costs for these new private areas. The outlook is that landowners who have received large payments from commercial running events with high entry fees will expect similar payments from orienteers!
As discussed at length at the AGM and the November committee meeting, we have therefore decided to increase some event fees, but have introduced new fee categories to help soften the blow for some runners. We have also reduced the club membership component of the British Orienteering membership fee from £5 to £1. In summary:
- League entry fees increase by £1 for pre-entry, and will carry a £3 premium for Entry on the Day. Entry on the day involves significantly more volunteer effort, and entry to league and most other larger events will remain open until until only 1 day before the event (so Thursday midnight, for a Saturday league, for example)
- Juniors will pay £1 for touch free hire, though standard dibber hire remains free for them
- MapRun fees are unchanged
- A new Family group fee is introduced
- A 50% helper discount will be introduced to help encourage club members (and others) to volunteer to help at events. How we process this is yet to be finalised, but it will be introduced as soon as we have a process in place both for inviting helpers to sign up, and enabling the discount
- newcomers, or nearly newcomers will be allowed to enter free of charge.
The table below lists all the changes, though the processes by which we handle some of them have yet to be finalised. The first event at which the new fees will apply will be the NGOC League event at Edge on Saturday 15th January; fees will be unchanged for the New Year’s Day score.
| Old(£) | New(£) | |
|---|---|---|
| NGOC club membership component of British Orienteering membership fee | 5 | 1 |
| NGOC League | ||
| Senior member, online pre-entry | 6 | 7 |
| Senior member, entry on the day (Note1,2) | NA recently | 10 |
| Senior non-member supplement (Note 3) | 2 | 2 |
| Junior member, online pre-entry | 2 | 3 |
| Junior member, entry on the day (Note 1,2) | NA | 4 |
| Junior non-member supplement (Note 3) | 0 | 1 |
| Family (2 adults + their children) Online pre-entry, (at least one member) | 16 |
|
| Family (2 adults + their children) Entry on the day, (at least one member) | 20 | |
| Family, no members, supplement (Note 3) | 0 | |
| Newcomers, passers by etc, pre-entry and EOD Note 3 | NA | 0 |
| Helper discount (Note 4) | NA | 3.5 |
| Touch Free Dibber Hire, senior | 2 | 2 |
| Standard Dibber Hire, senior | 1 | 1 |
| Touch Free Dibber Hire, junior | 0 | 1 |
| Standard Dibber Hire, junior | 0 | 0 |
| Maprun Events | ||
| Senior, Online Pre-entry | 5 | 5 |
| Senior, Entry on the day, Cash only | NA | 5 |
| Junior, Online Pre-entry | 2 | 2 |
| Junior, Entry on the day, Cash only | NA | 2 |
| Other events, Informals, SW league, etc | ||
| As at present, the entry fees for major and other one-off events will be determined based on a budget calculation made by the appointed Organiser and agreed by the committee. |
Notes
1. Entry on the day will be offered with card payments provided there is a satisfactory cellphone service at assembly. If not, it will be cash only, and is likely to be cash only at all MapRuns. The event details will state whether card payments can be taken at the event, or not.
2. Online entries for Saturday League events will normally be kept open until the preceding Thursday evening and for Mapruns until the evening before the event, at the standard rate.
3. Application of the non-member supplement, together with free entry for newcomers, will be at the discretion of Registration, for EOD entries. If newcomers pre-enter, they may be asked by the pre-entry system to confirm that they are indeed new, or very nearly new, orienteers, in which case the non-member supplement will be waived, and a further discount applied to their entry fee, though not such as to reduce entry cost to zero; pre-entry incurs transaction costs. The overall issue of free ‘come and try it’ runs still needs to be discussed and agreed.
Families who pre-enter using the family fee option will still be required to pay the non-BOF supplement for any individuals who are not BOF members. Note that this is a change from our initial statement on Family non-BOF supplements. It is due to the way the Fabian4 entry system works, but more importantly, to maintain equity with non family non-BOF entry.
4. Helper discount processing has yet to be agreed and finalised. The intention, though, is that you will be asked if you are willing to help in either or both the entry system and the event details, and helping on the day will earn a 50% discount on entry fees to the current or a later event.