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Indemnity Form Review
 
 

Purpose

  • Primary: Design a form to allow recognition of authorisation indemnities for event sign in. (preferably in conjunction with member sign in sheet)
  • Secondary: (sub task - re-format authorisation card layout to include "indemnity signed" statement same as member cards)
    • Re-format adult forms
      • possibly remove member without card form (does it matter if you are a member if you can't prove it?)
      • remove activity permitted field (or replace with tick-boxes)
      • remove "over 18" tickbox
      • reformat layout to improve readability
    • Re-format minor form
      • add spaces for multiple minors
 

Proposed Forms - as at 5 Jan, 2004

Below are draft copies of the proposed new forms. Each is available as either a Word Document or Adobe Acrobat File. Please send comments to: constable@sca.org.au

 

Comments on Draft Forms at 5 Jan, 2004

General:

  • Decouple the registry and marshallate from the indemnity process altogether.

    How this would work:

    1. Remove the indemnity bit from the membership form.
    2. Remove the indemnity bit from the authorisation form.
    3. Have a separate "indemnity" form. This is to be signed and returned to the Kingdom constable / lists officer, to be valid for 2 years. It gets you an indemnity card, to be valid for 2 years.
    4. Make indemnity cards available from the constable at each event.

    Advantages:

    • Don't need separate non-member and member sign-ins. You need to sign an indemnity to attend an official event, so you either show your indemnity card or sign a site indemnity.
    • Don't need separate membership forms for Australia and NZ.
    • Don't need separate authorisation forms for Australia and NZ.
    • Don't need to check membership cards at events to make sure people are not NZ members (and therefore have to sign a site indemnity anyway).
    • Only have one indemnity database -- that kept by the constable. Makes for easier tracking and electronic storage. Alternatively it could be run by the lists officer. Personally I'd prefer it to be run by the constable's office. We already have volunteers to do electronic storage of these.

Disadvantages:

  • You have to show two cards to fight -- an authorisation card and an indemnity card (auth card only in NZ).
  • What an excellent idea. A good piece of lateral thinking. Certainly makes sense. You don't need to have an indemnity form signed by the membership office , sorry, Registry. The major reason for signing an indemnity is for / at events where the likelihood of injury is greater than normal. This would obviously be at fighter activities, where the Marshall / constable "runs" the events.
  • It would get over a number of problems.
    • This then allows for online renewals because there would no actual need to physically sign the membership form.
    • Membership reminders could be sent electronically to those people whose membership is due for renewal. This would aid with 'forgotten' renewals. A blanket email to all members whose membership is up for renewal . Start three or two months before. Little cost to send an email especially in these days where 90% of people have email addresses.
    • Also, by allowing for online renewal, payment, Bpay or online transfer into the Societies bank account. This logically should help with or increase cash flow.
  • Decouple the registry and marshallate from the indemnity process altogether.

    My main concerns:

    • This proposal would increase the paperwork burdan of many officers, both local and kingdom. The paperwork requirements are hard enough as it is, we have a hell of a time going through this with each person every week at fighter training. It needs to be made simpler.
    • This erodes the advantages of Membership. Our group promotes membership as a way to not fill out an indemnity each time.
    • Memberships and indemnities will get out of sync and renewing them separately will cause confusion. Again the poor constable will need to check the expiry dates on both cards during check-in because they could be different.
    • Another mailing address that changes every couple of years will cause (more) problems.
  • Advantages: Don't need separate non-member and member sign-ins. You need to sign an indemnity to attend an official event, so you either show your indemnity card or sign a site indemnity.

    • If you can't show a membership card with "Indemnity Signed" printed on it, then you need to complete a indemnity at the event. Then there is only one form for all adults.

  • Don't need separate membership forms for Australia and NZ.

    • Separate forms for this are not too hard, or it could be one form with a checkbox for NZ and a note for them to cross out the indemnity section. Perhaps NZ will have their own registrar, making this a moot point.

  • Don't need to check membership cards at events to make sure people are not NZ members (and therefore have to sign a site indemnity anyway).

    • The Constable at the Event will have to check their membership card anyway to determine the entry cost applicable. Make the NZ cards a different colour.

  • Only have one indemnity database -- that kept by the constable.

    You end up with three databases: membership, indemnity, authorisation. You might end up with 3 sets of duplicated personal details which would be a waste of time. You come up with an arbitrary unique key (number) for each person (which isn't a membership number), or have a nonmember membership number :-)

    Personally I hope that we will move to one "membership" database containing membership, authorisations, and indemnity records. Requiring membership to fight would also fix a few problems, but that's another story.

          • Submitted by Will Cumyn, Seneschal, Shire of Arrowsreach (6/1/04)
  • This does seem to be a good idea. We would still need separate membership forms since NZ members will shortly be SCANZ members not SCAA members, but aside from that, it should make life a whole lot easier and drop out one line of data entry for our poor overworked Registrar. Very happy to hear that the Constables have not only a good idea, but also an implementation policy and volunteers, three stars for that lot!
  • Pros:I think this is a great idea ... but I do have a few addition suggestions
    • removing indemnity part from the membership and authorisation forms is good
    • having a separate indemnity form is good
    • but by reducing the workload for one office this means and increase in another so:
      • to reduce the workload have a state rep (read here multiple kingdom deputies one for each state) who will be responsible for the collection of indemnity forms and distributition of indemnity cards (numbered cards that are issued from kingdom level) within a given state.
      • using a database (i.e. Access - okay sorta plug I do work with it occasionally) with each state data basing & keeping up the process of scanning the indemnities this reduces the Kingdom workload
      • this then requires a monthly send to Kingdom of the updated database file and scanned indemnities
  • Disadvantage to process put forward by Del

One problem I foresee is that some part of our current membership fees go towards to insurance. By separating the indemnity from the membership this then removes the incentive for some to pay membership. I see a number of folks lining up to get indemnity cards and not membership - there is going to need to be some sort of fee associated with this otherwise there will be a drop in membership numbers - therefore reducing the income received by SCAA that pays for the insurance stuff.

Del - is incorporation in NZ going to be similar to what we have here in Aust? Will they be doing their own memberships, international or via Aust? This will make some difference in designing forms then that are universal for both incorporations.

Del - do we know what percentage of membership goes toward the insurance? Potential loss of income needs to be a major consideration factor in decoupling the indemnity from membership.

Blaeney - the minor indemnity form currently up for view - asks for the minor to sign. I find this highly amusing as it's a bit hard for a number of children (especially those who are not yet of school age) to sign something that while their parents may understand - is a bit incomprehensible for most minors. No other recreational group that I am associated with or have been associated with requires anything other than the parents signature on relevant forms for participation.

  • Implications for New Zealand
    • As someone who's been working on the incorporation process in NZ I love this idea. I'd just been reading over the proposed forms and noting that we couldn't use them in NZ at all, and dreading all the extra paperwork that would require.

      Please note, the SCANZ Inc will be implimenting a "day membership" system, whereby when you sign in at the gate you become a temporary member for the duration of the event. Our sign in sheets will _probably_ be similar to the proposed indemnity froms but with the "indemnity" clause left out. That particular clause appears to be problematic under the NZ Accident Compensation legislation.

            • Submitted by Belle (6/1/04)

     
 

Proposed Forms - as at 19 Jan, 2004

Below are draft copies of the proposed new forms. Each is available as either a Word Document or Adobe Acrobat File. Please send comments to: constable@sca.org.au

 

Comments on Draft Forms at 19 Jan, 2004

  • Is there any reason to have the "I am / am not * a current financial member..." on the forms ?
  • If this is the case, then can I suggest that you add clearly defined "members only" section that asks for the membership number. Something like a boxed area with a checkbox saying " I am a financial member of the SCA", followed by a field for the membership number. This would make it clear to non-members that they do not have to enter a membership number.
  • What would the membership number be used for in this case anyway ? How would it be used ? What happens when someone says that they are a member but can't remember their number ?
  • The issue of record keeping needs to be brought up at some point. I hear that the Indemnity forms are going to scanned in and kept in digital form. Will this archive be made searchable, ie, will any details from the form be entered into a database as fields ? Will the paper copies be kept as part of our legal requirement ?
  • The proposal to drop the "Indemnity Signed" from the membership cards removes the need for the Members Sign In Form. What is the status of the proposed removal of the Indemnity from the Membership cards ?
            • Submitted by Will Cumyn, Seneschal, Shire of Arrowsreach (19/1/04)
   
 
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Last updated 19 Jan 2004