SeattlePioneer Posted January 23, 2015 Share Posted January 23, 2015 My, but rechartering can be a pain in the neck! This year I devised a method that makes it EASY. MY experience is that 95% of rechartering aggravation comes because people don't do stuff in a timely manner. They don;t get trained. They let their YPT training expire. They don't pay their dues for the new year. And so on. My method bypasses all that. This year, as soon as I got the recharter packet, I looked at which adult leaders were eligible to have their memberships renewed. Those are the people who were enrolled as leaders for 2015. Then I looked at who was eligible for 2015 youth membership --- all of them boys who had sold our minimum amount of popcorn. Those boys had their membership renewed. Everyone else was dropped. Well, that was easy! I got the recharter packet on a Thursday, and by Saturday had the computerized recharter completed. Monday I got the Institutional Head signature and the Cubmaster's signature, and turned the recharter packet in to the DE on Thursday, a week after it had been issued. Our unit was FIRST IN THE COUNCIL to complete rechartering! A week ago I got a final list of popcorn sales, and several additional families got our "free" membership. I sent our DE a list of those names and their BSA registration number from the recharter, along with a check and asked them to reactivate those memberships. Monday I had several families pay me their Pack dues. I sent those names into the DE with a check and request that they be reactivated. I'll do the same as additional people pay for their pack memberships. That's FAR easier than going back and forth trying to flog memberships out of people when they aren't ready to make that commitment. Anyway, I like my method! I'd be interested in comments and alternative methods used by other units to complete rechartering. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mashmaster Posted January 23, 2015 Share Posted January 23, 2015 We print out a packet for each person and require them to submit medical forms, payment for the year, and YPT certificate. It is a lot of up front work but it works very smoothly for us. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
T2Eagle Posted January 23, 2015 Share Posted January 23, 2015 SP, I could be wrong about this, but I think the reason this seems easy to you is that you're creating more work for your council registrar and you have been fortunate that there is a lag time between when you submit recharter and your council finalizes it. You weren't really finished rechartering. If you complete your rechartering the council registrar should have to do no more than a quick review that all the "t"s are crossed and "i"s dotted i.e. everyone is the right age, adult YPT is up to date, you have all the required spread of necessary adult leaders, etc. Instead you have the DE, who really shouldn't have to spend any time on it, gathering your info and having to pass it on in usable form to the registrar, who may have to go in and do extra data entry cleaning up your now renewed members. Also, once a charter is really finalized by the council any one you try to renew will actually become a new registrant requiring new paper application, new round of signatures, and in the case of an adult new background check with all the attendant expense. Your method seems easy in the same way that lunch seems free. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
blw2 Posted January 23, 2015 Share Posted January 23, 2015 agreed. No way the folks in our council's office would go for that. Reactivation?.....fill out a new application! I've had to fill out so many application for just me..... changing positions, somebody lost it, change position again..... ugh. It's maddening when i know its a single database field that needs to be changed. I actually think that recharter isn't so bad, with just a little cooperation. If you have a treasurer that will confirm who has paid and you have leaders that will take the training soon after learning that their YPT needs to be re-taken (for example) and if you maintain a roster of you group (I do as a spreadsheet, just that simple) and if you keep your new applications current, rather than holding them for recharter Then all you have to do is run a trained leaders report sometime in the fall, and send a quick email to remind leaders who have training due, or coming due and sometime by Nov or Dec, check of on your roster who has paid. and highlight who has not (so you can verify that they are dropping) then it's pretty much a click through exercise..... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SeattlePioneer Posted January 23, 2015 Author Share Posted January 23, 2015 <> Tough! In my opinion, BSA makes WAY too many demands on volunteers to manage their complicated administrative procedures ---rechartering being a prime example. I seriously considered dumping the rechartering back on the DE altogether, but devised the strategy I devised which made things pretty easy. My preference is to not get involved in the rechartering at all. But I also hate to saddle another volunteer with a needlessly complex, cumbersome and annoying job to do. So my solution is to make the task as simple as possible for ME as a volunteer. As I understand it, the Council staff can pretty easily reactivate a membership for some significant amount of time after the new year. I provide them with the names to reactivate and the BSA identification number ---and a check --- which is $24 PER PERSON these days you know. If they have to do some work to complete that, tough. Frankly, I've had no complaints from the DE or council. The DE did recognize me at our last District Committee Meeting. He was laboring over listing the many units that hadn't completed their rechartering and that HE was laboring over with hand holding and encouraging leaders to complete the process. He recognized ME for being the first in the council to complete rechartering. He seemed to be happy with that, and no doubt happy that he didn't have to do a lot of hand holding as was common among MANY other units. (This was at our December District Committee Meeting). If you want to use more conventional methods to complete rechartering, help yourself. If your unit finds it burdensome and difficult, they might want to consider the simplified method I have described. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
blw2 Posted January 26, 2015 Share Posted January 26, 2015 ...... Tough! In my opinion, BSA makes WAY too many demands on volunteers to manage their complicated administrative procedures ---rechartering being a prime example........ I actually agree with that! I tend to like to conform and work within the system as much as possible, but I have long thought they push too much to the volunteers...... Really, recharter could be as simple as check one box by each member that is dropping. done, send the check! I mean thay already have all the applications.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scouter99 Posted January 26, 2015 Share Posted January 26, 2015 Tough! In my opinion, BSA makes WAY too many demands on volunteers to manage their complicated administrative procedures ---rechartering being a prime example. I seriously considered dumping the rechartering back on the DE altogether, but devised the strategy I devised which made things pretty easy. My preference is to not get involved in the rechartering at all. But I also hate to saddle another volunteer with a needlessly complex, cumbersome and annoying job to do. So my solution is to make the task as simple as possible for ME as a volunteer. As I understand it, the Council staff can pretty easily reactivate a membership for some significant amount of time after the new year. I provide them with the names to reactivate and the BSA identification number ---and a check --- which is $24 PER PERSON these days you know. If they have to do some work to complete that, tough. Frankly, I've had no complaints from the DE or council. The DE did recognize me at our last District Committee Meeting. He was laboring over listing the many units that hadn't completed their rechartering and that HE was laboring over with hand holding and encouraging leaders to complete the process. He recognized ME for being the first in the council to complete rechartering. He seemed to be happy with that, and no doubt happy that he didn't have to do a lot of hand holding as was common among MANY other units. (This was at our December District Committee Meeting). If you want to use more conventional methods to complete rechartering, help yourself. If your unit finds it burdensome and difficult, they might want to consider the simplified method I have described. Volunteer or martyr? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SeattlePioneer Posted January 26, 2015 Author Share Posted January 26, 2015 Heh, heh! Volunteer trying to AVOID being a martyr. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Create an account or sign in to comment
You need to be a member in order to leave a comment
Create an account
Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!
Register a new accountSign in
Already have an account? Sign in here.
Sign In Now