Lynton and Barnstaple - Operations and Development

I can't say I've ever experienced this, apart from the occasional item appearing in the Spam box. But then, as we learnt years ago, everybody knows to check their spam box before downloading, don't they ?

 

I think it depends on the actual sorting office. I work in Daventry and the Daventry sorting office is good. However I live a few miles away and our post there is sorted at the Northampton sorting office, which is pretty awful in my experience.

 

Some email providers block emails completely according to a blacklist of IPs and they are using them more and more. Virginmedia use such a systen and any offending email doesn't appear in your Spam box, you don't even see it at all.

 

Colchester has had delays of up to 4 weeks in the past few months, a nightmare trying to make sure Dad's medical appointments are kept to and sorting other legal things out

 

They do, and they have my sympathy over the workload involved. But that sympathy wanes when they've had time and opportunity to do this, including in response to events in 2021, and have not yet done so.

 

The thing is, if they employed someone they would then get criticism for that too probably?

 

Possibly - but from what we heard on Saturday about workload, those groans would soon subside.

 

I'm afraid I'm going to have to disagree with you on this point too Dave, EA's secretary did shareholders, updated share lists and issues, trackbed trails, accounts and many more other issues, it is only now that due to worsening health issues he is cutting right back, we have managed to find a wonderful professional company secretary to take on Tony's secretarial role, due to the mistakes made over the last 3 years something has to give, the mess up with Chris Duffell's nomination cost somewhere in the region of £6k for the reissue of papers so now no doubt that will be replicated with Anne's, so would it not be more cost effective to even hire one

 

E-mails are curious things.....as an example, last Tue I made an online booking for lunch in my local pub on Thur (it gets busy some days, so best to book). I went there and ate on Thurs. The confirmation of my booking arrived yesterday ! Normally the process takes about 2-4 hours.

 

No idea which our sorting office is - probably Daventry I'd have thought, but small chance of Banbury I suppose...

 

Don't get me wrong, I personally think that perhaps the size of the organisation it's now getting close to warranting a paid for secretary, at least one that can be used by both the CIC, the Trust and even perhaps OSHI, a shared cost as it were leaving others to be able to concentrate on other matters such as the Magazine, commercial aspects etc.
A volunteer role? Hmm, probably not now, but that's just my view with the ever growing size of the L&B or at the very least a part time position to support the voluntary secretaries.

 

I think the significant difficulty with email is asserting that the identity of the owner of the email address is the same person as the member who has paid their dues. Not easy, particularly if a paid-up member wishes to change their email address, or link an email address to a membership account that hitherto did not have one.

Those aren't insurmountable, but if you look at most organisations that transact some kind of important business, they don't do it by email. I think realistically you'd want to do it with an online members's portal that members would need to register on. (Send out notifications by email by all means, but returning votes would need to be online via an authenticated account). That's a non-trivial amount of tech for a small organisation.

Tom

 

There are many companies that offer such systems for hire as and when required - just post a link on the website, send access codes to members, for a verified log-in, or optionally they can still vote by snail mail (or in person) - Likewise, services like MailChimp can automate the members' email distribution - it's unlikely to be worth investing in your own software/tech for two times a year.

 

Quite. And SaaS services save reinventing the wheel each time.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

You're missing the point. Services like MailChimp can automate email distribution. That's not the same as automating members' email distribution. Anyone can send an email; the difficulty is knowing who is receiving it.

A service like MailChimp is ideal for marketing: it solves problems a small provider might have about sending out emails in bulk, and essentially if someone has signed up to receive a marketing email, you don't really care who they actually are in reality: it is sufficient to know that the person who controls the account at "landbnutter1898@mailprovider.com" is interested in receiving a marketing email about the L&BR. But it is an entirely different proposition to link up the fact that landbnutter1898 is also the person who has paid a subscription and is member 753 on your membership database, with a verified postal address and entitled to a vote. That's not easy.

Tom

 

Fair point - maybe not exactly Mailchimp, but for the member verification/voting process, if there is an email address and a mobile number associated with a membership, two-factor authentication is easy, and most/many people are familiar with that now. There are various alternatives that could be offered, depending on members' own circumstances/preferences, but by outsourcing to an expert supplier, all the intricacies can be handled without burdening the volunteers..

 

Surely you need to take into account the potential risk of abuse of the system ? I can't see many people bothering to send a fake vote return to a railway heritage organisation, even if they could. And I really can't see the difference in having member 753 identified by their email address or their postal address. There's nothing difficult about it.

 

Just out of curiosity Martyn, as I'm no IT expert but could a secure voting link not be put on something like a members page which you have to already log in to! Could the trust not make use of something that already exists

 

Dave, Are you 'avin' a larf?

 

Hmm, actually me old China would you Adam n Eve it, no, but I do like a good bubble bath!

Init all comes dan to the bees and 'oney in the old sky rocket....

Seriously though, there are a few who would question it I am sure.

Oh, BTW, my mother was from Suffolk, my father is from Cornwall and I live a good hour outside London. If I stay in the South West for any more than a few days my accent takes on South West very quickly due to the Cornish roots.