CTC Membership Services

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glueman
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Re: CTC Membership Services

Post by glueman »

Based on a cross section (sic) of four individuals who inhabit Chez Glue, there certainly are problems with membership. As a long-standing member, that's to say one whose silver badge was received enough years ago that I've forgotten where I've put it, I wouldn't consider myself prone to knee jerks or rhetorical flourishes where the club is concerned. That doesn't stop me saying membership issues and the responses to them are on the higher registers of the crap scale.

My attitude was that if me or mine were half flattened by a badly driven vehicle I'd seek out the silver badge, old bank statements and whatever evidence I could find that we are indeed members of the CTC and avail myself of its services, but a newcomer intent on gathering the artifacts of membership into a neat pile and weighing how much s/he wanted them may have a more pragmatic approach and think stuff it.

CTC is not yet in the elevated position of those cult bike shops who can afford to treat their customers contemptuously and still have them return for more. It needs sorting, not debating.
byegad
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Re: CTC Membership Services

Post by byegad »

I've had no problems with my membership. I'd guess that the vast majority of CTC members have had no problems with the Membership Department.

I am concerned that this thread has run so long without any real answer from the membership department. The only 'official' response seems to be a moderator worried this thread reflects badly on the CTC.


I'd venture to say that a reply is now mandatory!
"I thought of that while riding my bike." -Albert Einstein, on the Theory of Relativity

2007 ICE QNT
2008 Hase Kettwiesel AL27
2011 Catrike Trail
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Karen Sutton
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Re: CTC Membership Services

Post by Karen Sutton »

As the Membership Department is a Contractor, not part of CTC, they are not likely to respond to anything on the Message Board. They do not only do the CTC Membership, they work for other companies as well. The only people other than Members/Councillors who might respond would be staff. I'm not sure what the policy on this is.

We were told at the meeting on Saturday that the cost of Membership Services is similar, whether done in-house or by a contractor. However space constraints are the issue. If there was room at National Office for it to return in-house that would probably be preferable as the staff would be working only for CTC, would not be separate and therefore remote, and if they were in contact with the staff on a daily basis might have a better understanding of CTC and its members.
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Simon L6
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Re: CTC Membership Services

Post by Simon L6 »

Newsnet has a prize bit of dissimulaton. All's fair in the run-up to the AGM...........and the critical report is shoved right to the back end of the linked document. Respect!
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meic
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Re: CTC Membership Services

Post by meic »

I tried to read through the "dissimulation" but didnt have the stamina.
Do you call it dissimulation because it is a lot of over complicated work about what should be a straight forward issue or are you implying it is

a) untrue
b) avoiding the truth
c) telling the truth but in such a way that no-one will put in the effort to find it?

My impression was that generally
There is a reason why things went wrong in the past but that is done, There is a reason why things are going wrong now but that is to be expected and will be sorted. In the futrure everything will go to plan despite past experience to the contrary. :D
As it is outsourced the contractors past and present can be blamed and a new one found, problem solved.

Dont anyone bother attacking me (personally) for my opinion as it is just that. It is really a bit too complex for an outsider to understand in detail but unfortunately in the real world this system is dealing with outsiders. Outsiders who, uncharitably, are more concerned about it working than hearing that the level is acceptable and the complaints are trivial.

Feel free to convince me I am wrong and get a friend on your side than attack and gain an enemy. 8)
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Simon L6
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Re: CTC Membership Services

Post by Simon L6 »

sorry, meic, I'm just a bit tired - and in the big scheme of things it doesn't matter two hoots. The report published today was the report we should have had last April - and as it shows the interim report wasn't acted on. That's all.
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meic
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Re: CTC Membership Services

Post by meic »

Thanks, that is nice and simple to understand.
Yma o Hyd
Regulator
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Re: CTC Membership Services

Post by Regulator »

byegad wrote:I've had no problems with my membership. I'd guess that the vast majority of CTC members have had no problems with the Membership Department.

I am concerned that this thread has run so long without any real answer from the membership department. The only 'official' response seems to be a moderator worried this thread reflects badly on the CTC.


I'd venture to say that a reply is now mandatory!



We had that response at the Council meeting on the 24 October in Manchester.

The response was basically that those raising concerns about membership on this thread were "disgruntled ex-councillors" and "conspiracy theorists". Examples of concerns or probelms presented to Council at that meeting, including the fact that they can't even sort out the membership problems of two members of Council, were dismissed by the Chairman as "anecdotal" - he forgets that multiple anecdotes = data.

I think that says it all.
mw3230
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Re: CTC Membership Services

Post by mw3230 »

Regulator wrote:.......................The response was basically that those raising concerns about membership on this thread were "disgruntled ex-councillors" and "conspiracy theorists". Examples of concerns or probelms presented to Council at that meeting, including the fact that they can't even sort out the membership problems of two members of Council, were dismissed by the Chairman as "anecdotal" - he forgets that multiple anecdotes = data.

I think that says it all.


I'm neither a disgruntled ex-councillor or a conspiracy theorist so I have no axe to grind. However, my brother joined the CTC at the beginning of September and has yet to receive any communication from Membership Services. Simple lack of basic customer service. Unacceptable in my view.
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Simon L6
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Re: CTC Membership Services

Post by Simon L6 »

he'd be best off contacting Regulator for advice. Please see the posts above re the difficulties in September. Sorry.
byegad
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Re: CTC Membership Services

Post by byegad »

Well I'm a member of CTC for the magazine and third party insurance, the latter is also offered by my car and cycle recovery service so it's really the magazine. £6 for a magazine is a bit steep so if the official attitude is that I'm disgruntled maybe I should be?

I'll keep on watching this thread in the (vain??) hope of a sensible reply from someone willing to address the problem. My renewal is due in October so you have 11 months!
"I thought of that while riding my bike." -Albert Einstein, on the Theory of Relativity

2007 ICE QNT
2008 Hase Kettwiesel AL27
2011 Catrike Trail
1951 engine
thirdcrank
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Re: CTC Membership Services

Post by thirdcrank »

I've spent a rainy Sunday morning (with a gale forecast :( ) reading all the stuff now published as the membership review.

As an aside, there's all sorts of stuff in the outsourcing bit, including the amount the CTC received from the last CTC shop.

Complaints do seem to be a central issue and depending on POV are either rare manifestations of disloyal boat-rocking or the tip of an iceberg in the shipping lane. Of specific relevance to what's been said on here, it seems to vindicate Si 100%.
Other than those received in writing at Director level, there appears to be no formal process at CTC or arvato for complaints.


Incidentally, this also suggests nobody can really have the faintest idea which of my maritime metaphors is nearest reality, or indeed if it's somewhere in between. (Interesting nautical fact:- RMS Titanic was equipped with the latest in binocculars for the use of her lookouts. The keys to their locker were forgotten when she set off on the fateful voyage, so the bino's were never used. :shock: )

As for that gale, it's getting windier as I speak. (it was going to be an early fireworks display for my grandsons, but they will have to wait till they get back from hopefully sunny Cyprus. 8) )
Karen Sutton
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Re: CTC Membership Services

Post by Karen Sutton »

thirdcrank wrote:I've spent a rainy Sunday morning (with a gale forecast :( ) reading all the stuff now published as the membership review.

As an aside, there's all sorts of stuff in the outsourcing bit, including the amount the CTC received from the last CTC shop.

Complaints do seem to be a central issue and depending on POV are either rare manifestations of disloyal boat-rocking or the tip of an iceberg in the shipping lane. Of specific relevance to what's been said on here, it seems to vindicate Si 100%.
Other than those received in writing at Director level, there appears to be no formal process at CTC or arvato for complaints.



thirdcrank, I'm not sure who or where/what that quote came from (about no formal process for complaints), but I thought it quite ironic that to arrive at the link to the Membership Review literature on the CTC website you have to scroll past the CTC Complaints Procedure. Or maybe it was intentional to put it there? But perhaps, like Simon, I'm also a bit tired and not spotting the subtleties?
thirdcrank
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Re: CTC Membership Services

Post by thirdcrank »

Karen Sutton wrote:... thirdcrank, I'm not sure who or where/what that quote came from (about no formal process for complaints) ...


I should have been more meticulous in my attribution, rather than assuming that everybody else had read the whole lot. Sorry.

The final document in the series of documents published together is Mick Simmons' "CTC Membership Review" - June 2009. I understand this to be the document presented at the most recent Council Meeting. There is an appendix to the report which follows immediately after the report's Conclusions and is on PP 5 - 9 without an explanatory heading. It seems to include the progress summary referred to in page 2 of the report. My quote was the first of 5 comments, including one new recommendation dealing with "(ix) Investigate ways of more accurately tracking progress of members' complaints."

What I've written sounds complicated, but to me it seems clear for anybody who has access to those documents and is prepared to read them. Altogether, there is an extract from the minutes of the Management Committee Meeting on 24 September which received Mick Simmon's report and the papers (including Mick's report) relevant to that meeting.

It could be said that there is a lot to plough through, but it seems to me that is in the nature of committee minutes and supporting papers. I'm not sure there is a real alternative because that would imply some sort of summary which would be open to claims of bias in presentation. I suppose I was hoping I might tempt or provoke more people into reading through these papers - even if only to tell me I was talking rubbish. And it does seem to show that Si was correct about not airing complaints on here.
Karen Sutton
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Re: CTC Membership Services

Post by Karen Sutton »

Ah, I see now. I hadn't realised it was a quote from the documents on the website. I had supposed that it had come from this thread and I'd missed it somehow.

Yes, the report from June 2009 was the document discussed by Management Committee at their September meeting. It is also the document referred to by Simon when he started this thread. However I wouldn't say that it was presented to the most recent Council meeting. As I mentioned earlier in the thread it was decided that the Management Committee decisions on the Report would suffice, and that in actual fact not all the Councillors at the full October Council Meeting had seen the Report. They are now able to as it is on the website, as it should be.

You have also just clarified what it was that Si was to be vindicated of as well. I confess to puzzling over that earlier. However I don't think we should think only of views aired on this thread as complaints. I'd say that Simon started the thread with the intention of bringing the report to the attention of members. I agree with Si and yourself thirdcrank, that the correct way to complain is via the correct channels. Yet, as Mick Simmons has pointed out in his report, there isn't a way to do this except in writing. There does not seem to be a recommendation from Management Committee to change that. I have read through Management Committee's recommendations based on the Report findings, and cannot see anything about the Complaints procedure. However, I would be pleased to be proved wrong and I would recommend that everyone reads these documents. Then perhaps someone could tell me where it says they are going to simplify the complaints process.

Then, once that is done people with Membership problems might be more inclined to make a complaint through official channels. CTC may then have more reliable statistics on the level of complaints, and those of us who have a deep interest in this might feel more able to trust the figures.
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