Minutes of Finance Sub-Committee

Held at Mumeishi 15^th October 2006

Present: President, Chairman, Iai & Kendo Bucho’s, Treasurer.

Apologies: Jodo Bucho.

1. 2006 Status & Projection

Talked through results to date and the projection for this year (papers were circulated in advance, and the same projection is attached as appendix 1 to these minutes, although they are a few weeks out of date now and show the Europeans projected to lose £3,000 when we currently expect the loss to be £5,700 - with this sole exception they remain up to date).

There is still every chance of the association having a breakeven year.

Recognition where due that the cost saving measures and income generation steps the EC took late last year are paying dividends.

2. 2007 Budget

The draft circulated in advance was discussed and broadly agreed without amendment. (Copy included in the same appendix containing the projection of 2006 finances).

Key points:

1. Membership - It is starting to look like our membership numbers are struggling to get to 1600 this year. We might just scrape it yet but its not certain. It would be safe to assume no growth for next year – ie same income as this year. There is a separate agenda item on fees – which we can overlay on this once we decide what we do with fees.
2. Menjo Income -Assume broadly the same as this year.
3. Association Running Costs - Broadly the same as this year – this assumes we have the same number of meetings as this year, which seems likely given the Lidstone affair has not gone away, the Iai UDI report will need consideration and in 2007 the constitutional review will be delivered which is bound to need discussion.
4. Communications -Again broadly as this year – though there are two points for debate:
   1. Should we aim to invest a bit more behind PR?
   2. Is it time to spend some money on our web site, per our PR officer’s comments at the October EC and the interest in a member’s area?
5. Courses / Coaching / Events / Squad - The coaching group want to run several regionally based courses next year and these should be supported where possible. IPD has provided some details which would indicate we need to be providing the backing for them to source course materials. Obviously there will be a course charge and we can assume some care in travel x’s. Suggest we start with £1k.
6. This and the assumption that Iai/Jo would want to spend something on squad next year (been a pretty lean year in C06) means C07 would be a more expensive year than C06.
7. International Events:
   1. IKET - Despite 2006 being the best yet and hitting budget there seems to be a majority opinion in favour of having a years break.
   2. 5 Nations – Budget of £7.5k agreed.
   3. European Kendo Championship - a nominal £5k for this event seems reasonable given Lisbon is accessible via EasyJet.
   4. European Iai & Jodo Championship - I am not aware of timings or venues for this event. I would therefore suggest we assume £5k each for Iai / Jo. I am told this was the traditional approach.
8. Bu Events -It seems possible that like this all Bu’s aim to break even across seminars / gradings / taikai and preferably generate a small surplus? No plans were mentioned that make this impossible. There does appear to be room for Iai to run another event within this constraint.

3. Membership Fee’s for 2006.

Appendix 2 contains the paper discussed. After much debate it was agreed:

1. To reduce the validity of Temporary Membership from 3 months to 2 months, but to leave it at its current nominal £10, and that this should also serve as the ‘joining fee’ as current practice.
2. To retain for 2007 the current split Kendo vs iai/jo membership rates. Although the kendo coaching supplement is administratively complex the finance group would prefer to not to change the cost of full membership in 2007 (making it 3 years in a row the cost has been static) and so the coaching differential will stay in place for next year.
3. However the iai bucho was asked to actively consider and canvass opinion on doing away with the differential in 2008. No decision required till late 2007.
4. Recognised that the direct costs of association membership (Insurance, EKF, admin etc) means that we make a significant loss on Junior memberships and only just break even on concessionary memberships. Both groups are priorities for support and development, but not for subsidy. Neither membership groups contribute to funding any of the major events or other activities. Agreed to recommend to EC that a concessionary renewal should increase from current £20 to £30, and that Junior renewals should rise from £10 to £20.
5. Also agreed that Junior rates would (as current) be the same for all of Kendo / Iai / Jodo, ie no differential on juniors.
6. Current practice of Concessions & Juniors being exempted from late renewal penalties would be done away with – being impossible to explain or justify.
7. Current differential between renewal / new / upgrade would be maintained. Exception being Juniors, who are currently exempted from the joining fee and hence tend to join as new members rather via the temp route (for info a membership book costs us £5).
8. Lastly but importantly, although renewals are clearly stated as being due by 1^st January the penalties for late renewal do not currently start until end of January. Noted that this oddity leads to half the membership not bothering to renew on time and agreed to change this date of late penalty effectiveness to the 1^st January.

These conclusions lead to the following membership charges being recommended to the EC for 2007 (yellow indicates a change).

4. 2007 Membership Renewal Process.

Membership process will be broadly as per 2006. Renewal notices will go out in early December, probably with last newsletter of the year and with a letter from the Chairman.

However dojo renewals will be a little more sophisticated, with the mail shot including that dojo’s list of members, hopefully allowing dojo leaders to help chase individual renewals. Noted that although a lot of work this year has resulted in a Kendo membership list mostly up to date, the equivalent lists for Iai and Jodo are in a very poor state. Iai bucho asked for a copy of the list (posted after the meeting).

5. Capitalising SAGE software & Membership Scanner

The Treasurer proposed and there were no objections to the association capitalizing the spend involved in implementing SAGE (£490 in total) or the printer/scanner bought for handling membership forms (£150). Life thought to be 3 years for both items.

6. Reserves Policy

There was some discussion on the current level of reserves and the desired state. At the end of 2006 the association had almost £37k in reserve. There was a general feeling expressed that we ought to make better investment use of our reserves than having them sat in a deposit account. No one thought that the current level was insufficient. After some inconclusive discussion agreed that we would aim to maintain the current level of reserves and possibly allow them to increase slightly year on year, but not aim to aggressively increase them.

7. Procedures for Managing events.

a.Cash – agreed there is a bit too much cash wallowing around in some of our events. Cash should be banked and not used to net off expenses.

b.Receipts - Expenses should be claimed for with receipts.

c.Dojo Split – Agreed to delegate upwards for EC for discussion

8. Claims Timeliness

There are a few people who have been inordinately late in submitting expenses. Reminder of our policy – expenses should be submitted within a month of an event, the BKA aims to refund expenses within a month of claim submission.

9. Year End Planning

Reminder that claims for all events (especially 13WKC !) must b in before year end. Also that people holding stock will need to do a count at year end.

10.A.O.B.

No AOB was raised. There being some rush to leave after a good 90 mins of finance talk.