Renewals after a lenghty lapsed period [3066]

• 11-09-2009, 3:55 PM

  15045

  AnnaP Joined about 2 years ago Posts 8

  Change rules for renewal date calculation for lapsed members [3066] I would like our members who have lapsed to be able to renew and have their updated renewal date be accurate.  As the system stands now, if a member lapsed on September 1, 2007 and renews, he or she will be renewed through September 1, 2008- and still be lapsed.  I f a member is lapsed, could he or she have their renewal date be one year from the day he or she renews?  That would be logical, and make it so much easier than members who are angry over their renewal date. It appears that others would liek to see this too:http://community.wildapricot.com/thread/14168.aspx Thank you!   anna

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• 11-13-2009, 1:20 PM

  15167 in reply to 17260

  Chief_Apricot Joined about 5 years ago Toronto Posts 4,265

  Re: Change rules for renewal date calculation for lapsed members OK, I guess this applies to membership levels using 'Join date' renewal policy. As I understand the suggestion, it should work this way: Past due members in Active status (probably on grace period etc.) should renew to anniversary of join date Past due members  in Lapsed status should renew to anniversary of payment date. In a sense, this becomes their re-join date. Correct? Would appreciate feedback from others.  Dmitry Buterin, Chief Apricot

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• 01-07-2010, 3:37 PM

  15983 in reply to 15983

  Anonymous

  Renewals after a lenghty lapsed period [3066] While the renewal process can save a lot of work, sometimes there are situations that can create unexpected results. Here's an example of one. Let's say the following has happened today (Early January, 2010): - A member joins in 2006 for a level that requires a manual renewal on January 1st - A member goes into "Lapsed" mode when they do not renew on January 1st, 2007. - In May 2009 they decide they want to renew. - When they do the system moves the renewal date to January 1, 2008. Obviously, they have paid for another year, but their renewal date is set in the past. We want to fix this problem, and have some ideas, but we'd love to get your feedback on it. Our current high-level concept is that is advance to the next renewal date after the current date. There are still a lot of details to be worked out, however. When a member renews after a lengthy lapse in their membership, how do you want the system to treat their next renewal date?

• 01-07-2010, 3:40 PM

  15984 in reply to 15983

  Teri Joined about 2 years ago Posts 71	Re: Renwals after a lenghty lapsed period [7491] I would want it to work as if they are anyone else renewing on this date--renewal for the next renewal set date or one year from the day they renew.   Teri OFLA
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• 01-12-2010, 4:38 PM

  16101 in reply to 15984

  iant Joined about 2 years ago UK Posts 135	Re: Renwals after a lenghty lapsed period [7491] I agree. Set the date to one year from today. Anything else would become unmanageable.
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• 01-13-2010, 11:27 AM

  16115 in reply to 16101

  duks Joined about 4 years ago Posts 12

  Re: Renwals after a lenghty lapsed period [7491] Question since I haven't had this happen yet.....but if someone renewals after this lengthy period of time, is it going to say they have been a member since the first join date, even though they might have lapsed for a year or 2?  We sometimes give recognition to members based on length of involvement and if there isn't a clear definition of "member since" that field will be useless. Thanks Jennifer Taylor Ohio Wildlife Rehabilitators Association www.owra.org

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• 01-14-2010, 11:04 PM

  16172 in reply to 16101

  BandWired Joined about 2 years ago Posts 6	Re: Renwals after a lenghty lapsed period [7491] Setting the date to one year from today (when the renewal was submitted or  approved), makes most sense to me.
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• 01-18-2010, 1:49 PM

  16241 in reply to 16115

  Anonymous

  Re: Renwals after a lenghty lapsed period [7491] Jennifer: Even after a lapse in renewal or renewal after a long period of time, the "Member since" field on the Member details will remain the same. Out of curiosity, are you looking for someone like a "Active membership time" that would count the number of days they've been active for - let's say that they a member for all of 2007, do not renew for 2008 but renew for 2009, this field would say they have been a member for 730 days?

• 01-20-2010, 8:03 PM

  16277 in reply to 15983

  ht2151 Joined about 2 years ago Posts 16	Re: Renewals after a lenghty lapsed period [7491] I agree that the date should be 1 year from today. I've run into this problem numerous times.  Also, on a lesser note, it would be useful to have an "active member time" field to search for exactly how long someone has been a true member.
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• 01-30-2010, 11:59 AM

  16507 in reply to 16277

  Tim Joined about 2 years ago Posts 14

  Re: Renewals after a lenghty lapsed period [7491]   Do we need a threshold at which we consider that the lapsed period was "lengthy"? For a member who was simply late renewing then I think that their renewal should run to the next anniversary of their previous date of joining as it does now. For a member who has effectively rejoined after a "lengthy" period of non-membership then it makes sense for the new membership to run to the anniversary of on which they rejoined.

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• 02-01-2010, 9:03 AM

  16527 in reply to 16507

  Chief_Apricot Joined about 5 years ago Toronto Posts 4,265	Re: Renewals after a lenghty lapsed period [7491] Tim, I like your idea, it makes total sense to me. Comment anyone? Dmitry Buterin, Chief Apricot
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• 03-03-2010, 11:44 AM

  17201 in reply to 15983

  Susan Steele Joined about 2 years ago Posts 4

  Re: Renewals after a lenghty lapsed period [7491] Just wanted to add my two cents: We just started using Wild Apricot and we are rolling it out to our 230+ members next week.  Previously, all members renewed on January 1.  We are now moving to rolling renewals for a number of reasons. In testing our renewals, I've realized that everyone's renewal date is showing up as January 1, 2011, not a year from the date they renew.  We've figured a way to let people know what's going on and we will manually change each renewal date in our system. My point is that organizations, like ours, moving from a calendar date renewal to rolling renewals would also benefit from a change.  There should simply be an option to set the renewal date one year from the last renewal.

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• 03-05-2010, 5:23 PM

  17260 in reply to 15983

  VCOMA Joined about 3 years ago Posts 76	Re: Renewals after a lenghty lapsed period [7491] It seems obvious that if the setting is that renewal happens on join date, it should reset to "rejoin date".  They shouldn't be paying for time they weren't a member.
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• 03-25-2010, 3:02 PM

  17540 in reply to 17201

  macholz Joined about 2 years ago Posts 4

  Re: Renewals after a lenghty lapsed period [7491] I agree with Susan.  My organization has a policy of renewal date being 1 year from the last date paid - currently I have to monitor and modify all membership renewals.  I would like to see an option for the system to automatically set the renewal date to one year from the last renewal. I would like to see this work for both online and manual payments (In my experience currently the renewal date does not change when the administrator confirms payment from a member renewing manually).

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• 05-08-2010, 9:27 AM

  18111 in reply to 16507

  BandWired Joined about 2 years ago Posts 6

  Re: Renewals after a lenghty lapsed period [7491] Tim: Do we need a threshold at which we consider that the lapsed period was "lengthy"? For a member who was simply late renewing then I think that their renewal should run to the next anniversary of their previous date of joining as it does now. For a member who has effectively rejoined after a "lengthy" period of non-membership then it makes sense for the new membership to run to the anniversary of on which they rejoined. The hard part is determining when a member is late renewing versus rejoining. One solution could be to say that renewals happen in the first year after a membership expires, and then afterwards it's considered rejoining. (If it can be split up that way, it would also be nice to have special rejoining rates, emails, etc...) But it's always seemed to me that we're talking about different models of membership periods. Wild Apricot's current model seems to be based on the idea that once a member, always a member, and that payment simply covers periodic obligations. If you fall behind on payments, you're still a member, but accrue renewal payments. Other models seem to hold that membership is only valid when paid for, so that there are no renewals, only rejoining.

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• 05-10-2010, 10:09 PM

  18148 in reply to 18111

  ht2151 Joined about 2 years ago Posts 16	Re: Renewals after a lenghty lapsed period [7491] I am of the mind that membership is only valid when paid for. I like Tim's idea of developing something like a grace period for when someone is simply renewing late versus when someone re-joins and renewal date is re-set to 1 year from renewal date. One organization might want to set it to 2 weeks while another may like it set to 2 months.
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• 05-11-2010, 4:54 AM

  18151 in reply to 18148

  iant Joined about 2 years ago UK Posts 135	Re: Renewals after a lenghty lapsed period [7491] The "grace period" idea does seem like the simplest solution that should cover most peoples requirements - set it short or zero for the "not a member unless paid" view, or 2-3 months for those with a more laid back attitude. Regards, Ian worthing and adur chamber of commerce
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• 05-11-2010, 4:38 PM

  18182 in reply to 16527

  skipat Joined about 3 years ago Posts 111

  Re: Renewals after a lenghty lapsed period [7491] I certainly can understand why most organizations want a rolling renewal date.  However, we need to keep a fixed renewal date, so would want that to be an option.  As a ski club, we have always operated under a ski season year, since our primary activities occur in a 3 month winter period.  We require membership in the current ski season in order to participate in any trips offered during that season.   People sign up for our longer fly trips in August for trips that occur in Jan, Feb and Mar.  I don't want to have to manage people signing up for a trip, then having their membership lapse before the trip goes.  We want our members to be current members not only when they sign up for a trip, but also when they take the trip.  A related issue --- if renewal dates move to individual 1 year periods, this will also exacerbate the problem of event managers entering attendees manually, since now there is no notification that the attendee is actually a current member when these attendees are added manually.  If that issue is not addressed it will make it much harder for us to control access to our trips for current members only.

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• 05-12-2010, 11:29 AM

  18209 in reply to 18182

  AnnaP Joined about 2 years ago Posts 8	Re: Renewals after a lenghty lapsed period [7491] I would not want any member to pay for time that they were not a member.  if they lapse, and then rejoin, like others said here, they should begin again from the re-join date.  I hope this happens soon!  It would be a huge change for us.  We constantly go in an edit expiration dates.  thanks.
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• 05-12-2010, 1:43 PM

  18222 in reply to 15045

  HHuckeba Joined about 2 years ago Arkansas Posts 16

  Re: Change rules for renewal date calculation for lapsed members I gave a response on a similar thread about renewals, but I'll add my thoughts here as well: What we would like to do is have one price for members who renew on-time or within what we decide is an acceptable grace period. As long as they renew within this time, their renewal date stays the same and it's the "renewing" rate. If a member fails to renew within that grace period, then in effect they are re-joining and would get a new renewal date. I also want to charge these people more, as a way to provide an incentive to stay active. The ideal way we would work this is it would cost $30 to join our organization (for 1 year), with every 1 year renewal period costing just $25. Renew on-time and it's $25 per year. But if you lapse and have to be re-activated, then it will be $30, and you'll be eligible for the $25 renewal rate the next time you renew if you renew on time. This would both give incentive to paying on time, as well as clean up the issue with a never changing renewal date when someone finally "renews" 6 months or even 13 months later. Off-topic for this thread, but I just started this similar topic on the general discussion board, is we would also like to give members the chance to choose their renewal length upon renewing. All our members are currently 1 year members, but we would like them to have the option to renew for 2 or 5 years at a discounted rate (discounted over paying for 1 year at a time). We feel this will help members stay active longer, as many of our lapsed members really just forget to renew but WANT to stay active. If they have the choice to pay for more years at once, especially at a discounted rate over the yearly rate, I think that will boost our levels over time. Thanks

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• 05-12-2010, 4:03 PM

  18236 in reply to 18222

  Michael Jabbour Joined about 2 years ago Posts 4	Re: Change rules for renewal date calculation for lapsed members This would be a very important features our association. Thank you for those that have contributed.
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• 05-20-2010, 12:33 AM

  18342 in reply to 18111

  jimdinatale Joined about 3 years ago Posts 1	Re: Renewals after a lenghty lapsed period [7491] Why not allow the threshhold to be determined by the administrator?  I'd be inclined to peg it to the "lapse" date.  In any event, i agree with the general sentiment that we need to be able to tell a "reborn" member that they get a full year's membership for a year's dues.
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• 08-04-2010, 2:40 AM

  19098 in reply to 18342

  Kyle Joined about 2 years ago Vancouver Posts 42

  Re: Renewals after a lenghty lapsed period [7491] Will the following procedure function as a work-around in setting a threshold and allow for "reborn" members to have their expiry date set 1 year from the date they renew? -30 days after a member expires, I send out a Grace Period email notice telling them they've expired and access to member-benefits will no longer be available if not renewed soon. -15 days after that (45 since renewal due) I send out a lapsed notice telling them their membership is now inactive, set the renewal period to never, and move them to a "Past Member" membership level -Then if the contact goes online to renew any point after that, they are no longer presented with the Renew button but just the Change Membership Level button.  Upon changing membership levels from Past Member to a valid membership level like Bronze or Silver the renewal date is not the old date but a new date 1 year from the day they do the change. The problem I have with this work-around is that it may be confusing for some members who go online to renew but do not see that option.  Also, I lose the information about when the member originally expired. Maybe Wild Apricot staff can comment on whether this will work? Kyle Mitchell | www.spec.bc.ca

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• 08-04-2010, 7:14 AM

  19104 in reply to 19098

  Chief_Apricot Joined about 5 years ago Toronto Posts 4,265	Re: Renewals after a lenghty lapsed period [7491] Kyle, can you elaborate what exactly do you want us to comment on? Have you tested the procedure described above yourself? Dmitry Buterin, Chief Apricot
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• 08-04-2010, 2:56 PM

  19110 in reply to 19104

  Kyle Joined about 2 years ago Vancouver Posts 42

  Re: Renewals after a lenghty lapsed period [7491] No, I haven't tested it.  I'm planning on deploying this procedure and was just wondering if based on what I described you think it would work.  That is, I haven't made any false assumptions. Also, related question - if I have a Grace Period Reminder and a Lapsed Period Reminder setup (one at 15 days past and one at 30 days past), but I also set Reminder Period = Never at 15 days then the Lapsed Period Reminder would never go out, correct?     Kyle Mitchell | www.spec.bc.ca

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