next message in archive
next message in thread
previous message in archive
previous message in thread
Index of Subjects
Index of Subjects Quoting George White <aa056@chebucto.ns.ca>: > On Tue, 25 May 1999, Doug McCann wrote: > > > Sustainability is the next issue. Through voluntarism, corporate and > > personal generosity we can offer services to those who cannot afford the > > basic fee. If donations are greater than the shortfall from those in > > financial need, then the organisation will flourish. If not, we must > > provide a mechanism to offset the shortfall. This could be a 'built-in > > donation' or an implicit fee related to the value of voluntarism. > > The problem with coercing people into 'volunteering' is that you don't > always get good skill levels or work products. Many organizations that > rely on volunteers actually spend a very large part of their resources > overseeing the work of volunteers. CCN needs to maintain professional > levels of operation, and many of the tasks require some knowlege and > skill. Volunteering should not be coerced. But volunteerism can be valuated. Knowing the value of volunteered time can provide a basis for developing and/or justifying service fees. When a member or IP seeks rationalization for a service fee, then one can point to the value of labour services being provided. However, we would never want to get in a situation where we associate the value of volunteer hours with a payment for services received. We don't associate cash donations with services provided. > > This sounds like quite a lot of work to set up and administer. A simple > fee structure means more volunteer effort can go to running the things > that affect users directly -- how many volunteers like doing financial > administration? > The discussion on fees has been raised because some of our members cannot justify the current fee schedule to current and potential IPs. A flat fee of $200 or $400 is not defensible to many. While larger IP organizations can easily absorb the cost, the vast majority of our IP base or small, non-profits like ourselves. A fee structure that lists and valuates the services provided allows the IP to select the services required. Unlimited disk space may be of no consequence to a small organization. They may be satisfied with 1gb. A VDN may be of substantial value to a small firm, but how can one justify to $200 levy. One possibilty is through the 'cost' of other services provided. Doug M -------------------------------------------------------------- This mail sent through Chebucto IMP: http://IMP.Chebucto.NS.Ca
next message in archive
next message in thread
previous message in archive
previous message in thread
Index of Subjects