Solving pre-reg no-shows: pre-pay instead?

[Victor]

Just wondering if anyone has solved the problem yet of preregistration no-shows at big local tourneys. You know: pay up front at the time of registration .

Hey, you've got to pay months in advance of NACs. Why not divisional and sectional events, too? At least we wouldn't have totally skewed expectations for attendance figures -- like when 100 sign up but only 50 actually deign to arrive.

[jeff]

We've done that with a few events in NJ division - see examples like the Denise O'Connor events at the end of January in http://www.njfencing.org/schedule.html Perhaps nahouw or one of the other NJ members could comment on whether people liked it and if it reduced no-shows.

[R. Exnicios]

The 2004 Crescent City Open is using the "must pre-pay to pre-register" method this year; So far so good.

We decided to do this after tracking several other large events in our section and noticed a "no show" percentage ranging from 20% to as high as 53%.

Our registration as of March 2 is 54 people paid and their registrations confirmed and 93 registrations "pending" i.e. not paid yet.

Hopefully the pre-pay feature will give people a TRUE measure of how large the events actually are and will not be too much of an inconvenience.

Cheers

Hope to see you in New Orleans

[cowpaste]

How much are you charging for preregistration? How are you collecting the money?

[rcmatthews]

The problem with this that I see for our club is that the club pays for our registration fees. We can't pay online in this manner (I think). So we will have to be reimbursed, which takes months.

[glowstix]

i only like the pre-pay if you get a full refund if for whatever reason you can't make it after all.

[Victor]

Originally Posted by glowstix

i only like the pre-pay if you get a full refund if for whatever reason you can't make it after all.

... less a 5 percent handling fee.

[SäbelFechter]

Pay at time of registration is the usual procedure up here in Canada. In fact, for many tournaments you have to pay double the entry fee if your registration & payment are not in before the deadline (which ranges from a couple of days to up to a week or more before the event).

[oso97]

This year the Southwest Sectionals will be pre-pay, with a fairly stiff penalty for late pre-registrations. Its painful to book resources based upon people pre-registering and then not showing up.

Most of the LOC's for the Southwest Sectional Circuit are strongly in favor of doing it as well for next year, so more than likely that will happen. We'll need to work out some common protocols to use though.

[fluidfencer]

Paying at registration is common in the States as well. Pre-registration is primarily used for the larger events, since the clubs have made a significant commitment of resources (money/equipment/volunteers) in order to host the tournament.

AskFred has been a big help for us, mostly in planning how many strips to set up that morning. We generally don't require pre-payment, but if you want to avoid a $10 late fee (in some cases) you are asked to pre-register on AskFred. This would be for a local tournament (or small regional) with 30-40 entries for the bigger events.

Even for the smallest tournaments, we are at least asking that everyone pre-register using AskFred and the great majority do, probably because they know that it helps us plan/run a better tournament.

Our no-shows are minimal. Maybe because we know the other clubs in the region very well, or maybe its that old southern politeness thing ;-)

Originally Posted by SäbelFechter

Pay at time of registration is the usual procedure up here in Canada. In fact, for many tournaments you have to pay double the entry fee if your registration & payment are not in before the deadline (which ranges from a couple of days to up to a week or more before the event).

[Victor]

Given the sheer negative perspective of many folks, selling this idea might be made easier with a subtle shift in terminology.

If $X is the standard registration fee, for example, and $2X is the late fee, with $3X the day-of fee, you could simply rename the values...

And $X becomes the "discount" fee for early registration, with $2X the "standard" fee and $3X the day-of fee. Suddenly (voila!) you get a friggin' discount for paying up front!

[Inquartata]

Originally Posted by Victor

like when 100 sign up but only 50 actually deign to arrive.

"Only 50"?! ONLY 50! My Division would love to have this "problem". With us, it's more like "5 show up". We cannot afford to deter anyone by making them pay weeks or months in advance---and it IS a deterrent to some, who aren't sure they'll be able to get the time off or aren't sure they'll have the money until the last minute. The pre-pay option may merely result in fewer entrants even than in your scenario; it shifts the inconvenience from the organizers to the fencers, and they may vote on that decision with their wallets.

Both options have strengths and weaknesses. Which is preferable depends on many factors. If the only priority is predictability for the LOC, pre-pay may be a better way to go. If bringing in more interest matters, it may not be...

[R. Exnicios]

The CCO has actually done the Pre-pay plan for several years.

Here's the way we have handled some of the issues:

1: We are collecting money through askfred as well as people mailing us checks directly. In the past we accepted faxed registration and processed credit cards directly.

2: Clubs and Schools that pay the registration directly make arrangements with us. We even do a Purchase order for one University. Basically we work it out so that it is not a big deal.

3: Refunds. If you can't make it we give you all your $$$ back. If you paid through paypal or askfred we can't refund the nominal handling charge that is collected by paypal or askfred. (I think it's $1.00)

4: We don't do the double and triple fees. We want people to come and have a good time. There is a slight increase in fees if you pay at the door. It is NOT a penalty but an incentive to pre-pay. We just want to know ahead of time who is coming and who is not.

On that note, I know when my club looks at events they will not even consider a tournament that doubles the fee two or three weeks prior to the event. It's just too difficult to coordinate 10-25 college students that far in advance. (Herding cats?)

I think some tournaments and people running tournaments have really lost sight of what local events are for and what divisions and sections should be doing. Local events are not NACs!

Cheers

R

[rcmatthews]

Be careful, Sir. The powers that be might be watching.

[R. Exnicios]

Originally Posted by rcmatthews

Be careful, Sir. The powers that be might be watching.

I have been seeing this white van parked in front of the house. Hmm?

[oso97]

R,

Excellent points. I particularly like the idea of doing purchase orders for large groups. How do you handle doing that?

Its a pity you or anyone to present your views couldn't make it to any of the SSCC planning meetings over the past 2 years. Your input and experience would have been invaluable in shaping the direction that things are heading. Common consensus is usually the best way to handle things, and spreading knowledge and experience around can only benefit everyone.

And you're right that local events are not NAC's - there's a definite need for events of a developmental nature, and to provide opportunites for fencers who coming up through the ranks to practice their skills in an atmosphere that is friendly and recreational.

However, its also worth considering the question of if we (and by we I mean "as a fencing community") have a need for events of a slightly more formal nature (but yet not quite at the formality level of a NAC), servicing a wider geographical area and bringing together enough fencers of higher levels to form a critical mass, such that good training opportunities are available. Regardless of weather or not the USFA's "regionalization plan" goes through or not in some form or another, I think it IS valuable to have events that can bring fencers together from wider geographical areas than the local level, for its own sake. Obviously, you think this too, or you wouldn't be spending the time trying to promote the CCO over such a wide area.

Many other sports have several levels of competition, from the local, to the regional to the national, and its a successful model to follow.

There are many issues though present in making the jump from a local to a regional type of competition. Equipment, venue space, referees, bout commitee, and of course, the subject of this topic, pre-registration. As someone who's been involved in helping to promote regional competitions over the past 6 years, I speak from experience here when I say that it takes time to build the resources and habits to put on good regional level events. I also happen to think its worth it. Since the inception of the SSCC, there has been a growth in both numbers and strength of the events. There have also been a number of fencers from the region who used the SSCC events as opportunities to build their skills, and then have gone off to the national level and started making an impact there. Good coaching, lots of training and hard work are responsible for most of that, but I'd like to think the opportunities for strong, REGULAR competition on the regional leve also helped. The coach's of those fencers have told me it has, at least.

Victor and Inquartata right though, its a fine line to walk between predictability and planning and trying not to disuade interest. I'm not particularly crazy about the 1X, 2X, 3X model as its currently invisioned, but its right now the only one on the table thats been presented. As far as refunds, yea, I think its possible to do structure it differently as well. Here's one of the biggest questions as I see it: Which is the better way to do it: a high registration fee and a lower per event fee, or a lower registration fee and a high per event fee? We know how the National office has structured theirs, but I don't neccessarily think that the best way to structure things for regional events.

Some form of pre-pay is the way to go, definitely. How to structure refunds is another important question. Personally, I think if you make the commitment to attend, and then don't show up without saying anything, you should forfet your money. If you contact in enough time, then you should be able to get something back, but not neccessarily all.

Its all food for thought...

[KD5MDK]

I'm not especially fond of pre-payment. I realize the benefit it gives tournament organziers, but there are substantial drawbacks. I think I'm going to cancel on the CCO because I can't commit to pre-paying for something that far away, that far in the future, and with the unfortunate timing. (Collegiate Nationals are that weekend, so all the people I'd like to go to NO with are going to be in East Lansing.)

Then again, the SSCC fee multipliers are discouraging too. I considered recruiting several people for the Space City Open at the last minute, an event that could have used more fencers (Men's and Women's Sabre were both E1s) but didn't think anyone wanted to pay $60 to go. Same multiplier kept me from fencing Epee at the Rose Condon, after I discovered two weeks before that I like fencing epee a bit.

So I don't really know. The SSCC certainly doesn't have the problem of too few fencers showing up, but it would be nice if some third way was found. However, I don't see it.

[i'mnottelling]

Fencers shouldn't have to pre-pay or be charged outrageuos late fees for required qualifiers. That's like paying a bank just to talk to a teller! It's taking advantage of people when they have to attend these events.

i'mnt

to pre-

Originally Posted by oso97

This year the Southwest Sectionals will be pre-pay, with a fairly stiff penalty for late pre-registrations. Its painful to book resources based upon people pre-registering and then not showing up.

Most of the LOC's for the Southwest Sectional Circuit are strongly in favor of doing it as well for next year, so more than likely that will happen. We'll need to work out some common protocols to use though.

[oso97]

Originally Posted by i'mnottelling

Fencers shouldn't have to pre-pay or be charged outrageuos late fees for required qualifiers. That's like paying a bank just to talk to a teller! It's taking advantage of people when they have to attend these events.

Then I guess you've never had to run an event and had 50% of the pre-registered field not show up when you hired referees to handle the pre-registered field. Like happened at Southwest Sectionals last year. We barely cleared even on that event, because of that. All would be well and good if people would have some sense of respect and dignity and 1) only pre-register for events they intend to attend and 2) if they pre-register for an event, actually show up. There is a choice of course, and we can go back to having self-refereed pools and DE Tableaus. If however you want good events, run by good staff, that start on time and end on time, then ya know, you're just going to need to accept that the organizers of the event need at least somewhat accurate numbers to work with.

Fees are kept as low as possible, given that these are required qualifiers. And based upon the thoughts I've seen presented here tonight, I'm trying to convince the rest of the Section EC to figure out a compromise between late fees and pre-payment. I think i've worked out one, by having a set per-event fee and only having late fees apply to the registration fe with refunds for the per-event fee in all cases and refunds for the registration fee in the case of "extreme duress". Changing your mind cause you didn't feel like coming after all does not count as "extreme duress." Getting sick and ending up in the hosptial does.

KD5MDK its been realized the 1X 2X 3X fee structure for the SSCC does turn some people away. We've realized that and plans are in the works to change things for next year. Unfortunately, its going to probably involve some sort of pre-pay system because people can't be trusted with the pre-registration system otherwise. These things are decided by a committee that does not work in a vacuum, they do actually listen to comments. Thoughtful comments and ideas for addressing the issues are being solicited, potential compromises are always welcome, good ideas are ALWAYS needed!

[fencerX]

Originally Posted by Victor

Hey, you've got to pay months in advance of NACs. Why not divisional and sectional events, too?

Yes, why not? For example, most sectional events in the Pacific Coast section require registration and payment in advance. They include the Pac Coast Youth/Jr PCCs, the Senior PCCs, and section circuit events like the LB Open, Duel in the Desert, the Sierra Nevada Open, etc. Most use the non-refundable reg fee + the possibly refundable event fee approach. Fencers seem to like those events because they are fun and fairly well run, and what helps their organizers run them smoothly is having a good idea how many fencers will be showing up. Indications of interest in events via pre-registation alone doesn't really work well. What works better is when fencers back up their interest with their money with part of it non-refundable.

Think of it this way -- what's far, far more annoying than having to pay in advance is ending up travelling a long way to a tournament that's poorly run.