A Statement Regarding the Future of the Forum

[Ty Carpenter]

11 minutes ago, James R Gordon said:

Two Points:-

Point 1

Thanks Ty your response was helpful even though I am not sure I fully understood it.

Point 2
I have heard back from Invision about creating an account in Paypal and making payments from that account.

Paypal can be used for our Account Credit feature, yes. That option would be on the checkout page of the feature, starting here:

https://invisioncommunity.com/clientarea/credit/

Once the credit is applied, monthly payments would be drawn from that credit balance automatically.

The other option is to manually use Paypal each month to pay the invoice when the renewal is due.

James

I think we have our answer there. Set up a PayPal and pin it to the forum and have Invision debit the account monthly. Maybe update us periodically on the balance and shake the tree when we need more cash money.

[Chris Davidson]

19 minutes ago, Ty Carpenter said:

I think we have our answer there. Set up a PayPal and pin it to the forum and have Invision debit the account monthly. Maybe update us periodically on the balance and shake the tree when we need more cash money.

Sounds like that could be completed, expeditiously.

With that said, can we get a headcount of the participating members on this forum.

Once we have that number, divide it into the monthly cost.

Start a new topic(run for a few days?) asking for a confirmation from participating members if they can contribute the equal monthly fee. See what the response is.

Create a link which shows(doesn't give access) participating members the ongoing balance in the Paypal account.

Equal payment by all participating members.

Personally, I don't want to be reminded that we're going to run short on funds.

X amount of paying members x  X $amount = coverage.

 

 

 

 

[Ty Carpenter]

Chris, sounds like a good plan. I hope we can all agree to a plan soon. I think a head count post would be great!

[James DiEugenio]

I am in. 

[Guest]

And me. 

[Chris Davidson]

On 8/2/2022 at 10:51 AM, James R Gordon said:

I have contactacted Invision to see what the better packge would be for us and whether we would get a beneficial price.

Kathy is working out how many active members we have and who they are.

James

 

Kathy,

Any luck on the active member count/list?

[Douglas Caddy]

I am in also.

[Chris Davidson]

8 hours ago, James R Gordon said:

I should point out is that you have a problem with donations.

They have to come later. There is a present system but it is linked to my bank account.

Once someone has taken over then a new accounnt needs to be set up.

James

James,

So far, the total number of responses from contributors is between 10/15 people.

You already have the donation link set up to your account.

If everyone who has chimed in on donating, can contribute $5 at this time(covering 70$ for September) via the donation link, can you make a last payment for September?

This, in essence,would be a trial run for the future,with the contributing members knowing that our payment process would evolve via Paypal.

It would give everyone a little breathing space and allow more time for you to help the new administrator/others with running the forum via Invision.

If our initial $5 contribution total is not enough to cover September, just give us the remaining amount needed.

[Cory Santos]

Ok so to be clear these are not donations.   This should be clear this is for people to access and post on the forum.   Non payments should be access only.  

Edited August 4, 2022 by Cory Santos

[Paul Brancato]

I’m in for a paid website and think PayPal pinning sounds right. It is hard, as Kathy says, to know how much. What is the count over a several month period for active posters? How much is needed monthly to keep things afloat?

[James R Gordon]

I am not able to pick up the September payment but I can make the payment on your behalf.

As yet I have not informed Invision I am no longer the payee. My bank account is still linked to Invision. I am certain the donation link still operates for Paypal contributions. So I can make the payments on your behalf and I am willing to do so, The present payment - because of currency conversion -is now £60. That means you need to collect $80 [ not $ 70 ] to allow for the $ 60 payment. That is roughly $6 if 15 members are contributing.

Membership is our problem but there appears sufficient membership to meet the $80 threshold.

In the long run the EF has a serious funding problem. But if we can donate $80 each month [ and I pledge to transfer that payment to Invision on your behalf ] then the EF is still alive for the short term.

James

 

[David Von Pein]

1 hour ago, Kathy Beckett said:

I just don't think we should charge for posting. I might be in the minority here, but it doesn't seem right. 

I'm glad to finally hear someone say this, because if this turns into a Pay to Post forum, I'll have to stop posting altogether. (Which I'm sure will make some people here endorse a pay-to-post system even more heartily. )

But I just simply cannot afford any new expenditures at the present time. No way. No how.

So I hope some other alternative besides a pay-in-order-to-post system can be worked out.

Edited August 4, 2022 by David Von Pein

[Chris Davidson]

1 hour ago, James R Gordon said:

I am not able to pick up the September payment but I can make the payment on your behalf.

As yet I have not informed Invision I am no longer the payee. My bank account is still linked to Invision. I am certain the donation link still operates for Paypal contributions. So I can make the payments on your behalf and I am willing to do so, The present payment - because of currency conversion -is now £60. That means you need to collect $80 [ not $ 70 ] to allow for the $ 60 payment. That is roughly $6 if 15 members are contributing.

Membership is our problem but there appears sufficient membership to meet the $80 threshold.

In the long run the EF has a serious funding problem. But if we can donate $80 each month [ and I pledge to transfer that payment to Invision on your behalf ] then the EF is still alive for the short term.

James

 

Thank you James.

So, just to cover the month of September, I will start a new topic asking for everyone who has chimed in on this topic(and any others interested) who offered to contribute, go ahead and use the "donation" link once they are logged in and donate only $5.

I suggest we let this $5 contribution period last one week.

After one week, you can then inform us as to how much was raised, if we're short of the $80 mark we'll make up the difference.

Please do not inform us before a weeks time is up if we hit the $80 mark.

 

 

[Chris Davidson]

3 hours ago, Cory Santos said:

Ok so to be clear these are not donations.   This should be clear this is fir people to access and post on the forum.   Non payments should be access only.  

Cory,

Let's at least get September funded to give us a little more breathing time. This will allow us to work out what type of access format is preferred, among other addressable items.

 

 

 

[Chris Davidson]

3 hours ago, Kathy Beckett said:

But July 1 to Aug 1, there were 55 members posting.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Thanks Kathy.