Changes to Membership Subscriptions 2020

At the 2020 Annual General Meeting of the William Herschel Society, a proposal to revise the Society’s membership fees was approved. The purpose of the change was to reflect the benefit of individual’s opting for a paperless edition of the biannual Journal, to reduce the Society’s cost base and allow more revenue to be dedicated to to the Society’s good works. More details are available in the proposal here

The existing membership types of UK individual, European individual, and Overseas Individual with separate opt-ins for paperless Journals were revised to simply Herschelian (digital) and Herschelian (paper) . The annual subscriptions were revised to £13.00 and £18.00 respectively. The revised amount is not due until an existing membership is due for renewal.

Existing members who had opted previously for paperless Journals were transferred to Herschelian (digital). All remaining members were transferred to Herschelian (paper). Herschel Museum Volunteers were moved to paperless Journals. Honorary members retained the physical, paper Journal .

Nearly 100 of our members manage their subscriptions by Banker’s Orders or Standing Orders which are an arrangement between individuals and their banks to pay the Society each year. This means the Society cannot change such arrangements and members will have to contact their bank to remove the existing standing order and create a new one for the revised amount. If these changes are not undertaken by individual members, the first payment received per member for the old renewal amount will be accepted but the duration of membership will be pro rata’d based on the new amount due and rounding up the months offered. For example, if your new renewal fee is £18.00 and we receive £10.00, we will renew your membership for 7 months (10 / 18 * 12 months = 6.6666 months). This will give members more than 7 months to manage the change with their bank. As this membership approaches its revised renewal date, the member will receive 3 email reminders to prompt the required change in banking arrangements. If more convenient, members can pay by debit/credit card, PayPal, cheque, or cash (Sterling) rather than setting up a new Standing Order.

Important: In the event that the Society receives a second, third, fourth etc. Standing Order for the old renewal amount, they will be treated as a donation to the Society. The earliest this could occur is in March 2021 and so the member will have had a year to adjust their banking arrangements and have received prior reminder emails regarding their renewal. The Committee, staffed by volunteers, see this 12 month notice period as reasonable and has sent all affected members a physical letter outlining the changes and actions required.