Re: Motion regarding foreign registrations

[cemahan@aol.com]

Brilliant!  Thank you, thank you, John




-----Original Message-----
From: John Jones <jijones@usjoneses.com>
To: aisdiscuss <aisdiscuss@aisboard.org>
Sent: Sat, Aug 20, 2011 1:44 am
Subject: Re: [AISdiscuss] Motion regarding foreign registrations


I think we need to clarify some issues and put some things in perspective.

: While AIS was not receiving any money for registrations from foreign
ybridizers, that does not mean that they were not paying a fee to register
heir iris (to their Country Associate Registrar). In fact, almost all foreign
egistrants paid a fee, as enumerated on one of my previous posts.

: AIS is not supposed to make a profit by charging for registrations. The ICRA
llows Registrars to charge a fee to COVER COSTS. It was not the intent of the
riginal motion to charge foreign registrants a fee in  order to "balance the
IS Books."
3: Because we were not charging foreign registrants, we were in a deficit
ondition based of current expenses, specifically:
Registrar's salary (annual)  $9600.00
pproximate costs for shipping, postage, paper, toner, and other office costs:
900.00
 year depreciation schedule for Registrar's computer system:  $1300.00
(aprox)
Total annual costs:  $11,800
Assuming for the point of discussion that there are 600 registrations annually
rom North America and 700 from other countries.
If the AIS were to receive $15.00 from each registrant that would generate
19,500 far exceeding out costs. And before anyone jumps in and says "yes but
we
ave to print the R&Is and Checklists", that is true but we make a profit on
hat as well.
Remember also that before the Board decided to charge foreign registrants we
ould only receive 600 X $15.00 or $9000.00 (less than our current costs.
4: The real point of my current motion is to recognize that foreign
registrants,
nder the current fee structure, would be paying more (in almost every case)
han North American registrants (the AIS $15.00 AIS fee plus their country
ssociate fee). My current motion is an attempt to mitigate that issue.
The foreign Iris Societies set the fee that the Associate Registrars charge.
hether that fee goes to the Associate Registrar or not is their business, not
urs. Remember that the AIS pays their Registrar  (me) a fee supported by the
ee charged to registrants.
As i detailed in a previous post, the Associate Registrars provide a valuable
ervice to me, making my job much easier. (Note that that is a relative
tatement. The job of Registrar is still very difficult. Even dealing with some
f the North American registrants is a challenge...)
Before we worry too much about giving away $5.00 per foreign registration,
emember that 45 days ago we weren't getting anything from them. We need to try
o be as fair and even handed to everyone as we can. We also need to have a
niform approach to all foreign countries. We can't  have different standards
or different countries or people.
In receiving $10.00 per foreign registration we will generate an additional
stimated $7000.00 for a total registrations revenue of $16,000 which is still
n excess (significantly) of our estimated costs. Even if we adopt my "fee
haring" approach, the fee foreign registrants pay will go up from what they
are
ccustomed  to paying and I believe that additional fee will cause the number
of
oreign registrations to diminish to some degree, but obviously I have no
pecific data to support that.
Also if we don't allocate $5.00 of the $15.00 dollar registration fee to the
ssociate registrar (thus reducing the total cost to the registrant) we may
find
hat foreign registrants just stop registering irises (which is the antithesis
f our purpose). There is also some concern that some other country may
petition
he ICRA to become the World Wide Registrar for non-Bulbous Irises and the all
orth American registrants would end up sending registration requests to some
oreign country just as a result of our raising the fee at all.
So far I have had two responses to a recent email to all foreign Associate
egistrars describing my revenue sharing approach:
Jean Peyrard of France: "I agree it's a good solution, I transfer to the
French
ociety",
Sergey Loktev of Russia: "I consider the suggestion logical".

s to Susan's questions, my comments are interspersed below.
John
On Aug 19, 2011, at 12:10 PM, Susan Boyce wrote:
>  Hi all,
    Now that I am home from work, I can finally sit down and put my thoughts
 into words about this.
 In my opinion, I would like to find out some more information before I would
 vote to send $5.00 to the associate registrars in other countries.
 1.   Does the money the foreign associates receive go into their own
pockets,
 or does it go into their respective iris societies coiffers.
answered above
>  I would really
 hate to see us send an extra $5.00 just to end up in someone's pocket.
Remember that AIS pays me to be Registrar from registration revenues. Foreign
ssociate Registrars are performing a service at the behest of their respective
ris Societies. They deserve, under the rules of the ICRA, to charge a fee to
itigate their costs. But because they do and because we have decided to charge
oreign registrants a fee, the registrants are faced with paying a double fee.
hat is not particularly fair and it is what I am attempting to mitigate (among
ther reasons) with my motion. To as great an extent as possible, we should
reate an environment where by all registrants face the same fee structure.
ranted given all the various economies and specific country variations, we
will
ever have perfect uniformity, but we can do our best.
> 2.   What exactly does the foreign associates do?
Described in an other email
> Do they just forward the
 registrations onto us?  Do they translate effectively and/or correctly the
 registrations before sending them to us?
Some translate more effectively than others, but certainly better than I
could.
lus they add experience as to how to describe an iris clone and
correct/clarify
he registrations.
>   All of these questions should be answered before we should vote on any
 changes.
 Susan Boyce

 .
 .
 .
 .

> Subject: Re: [AISdiscuss] Motion regarding foreign registrations
> From: jijones@usjoneses.com
> Date: Thu, 18 Aug 2011 15:55:46 -0700
> To: aisdiscuss@aisboard.org
>
> The whole point of having a discussion after a motion is made is to get
 thoughts on the table and vet the subject.
>
> HOW ABOUT SPEAKING UP!
>
> John
>
> On Aug 16, 2011, at 12:47 PM, Michelle Snyder wrote:
>
>> John Jones moved and Cheryl Deaton seconded the below motion. As such it
 is open for discussion.
>>
>> "That each foreign registrant pay a fee of USD$15.00 (or its equivalent in
 the country currency) per iris registration or iris name reservation to the
 country Associate Registrar. That the country Associate Registrar keep
 USD$5.00 (or its equivalent in the country currency) per iris registration
or
 iris name reservation and pay the AIS USD$10.00 per iris registration or
iris
 name reservation, such payments to the AIS to be made via a PayPal system or
 such other arrangements as may be enumerated by the AIS Registrar-Recorder
for
 his convenience. All payments to the AIS registrar to be made in USD. The
AIS
 respectfully requests, but does not require, the country Associate
Registrars
 to accept the USD$5.00 stipend as full payment for their services as
Associate
 Register in managing iris registrations and iris name reservations. That the
 services of the country Associate Registrar include, but may not be limited
 to, iris name checking against the irisregister.com database, !
> translation (as appropriate), transliteration (as appropriate), and
 description review ad editing.
>>
>> Michelle Snyder,
>> AIS Secretary
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
__________________
ohn I Jones
egistrar-Recorder
merican Iris Society
isregistrar@irises.org

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