[committee] Membership 2008

[Scott Young]

> We probably need a new PayPal account (the current one being used is
> paypal-2007 at ucc.gu.uwa.edu.au).

Okay. What's the rationale behind using a different PayPal account for
each year, not just paypal at ucc?

> It might just be easier to create <paypal-2008 at ucc.gu.uwa.edu.au>
> and make sure not to mark us as a non-profit organisation.

Looks like it. Although didn't you say there was another option? Isn't
it worth at least chasing them up with an email (I thought they also
asked just for an explanation of what exactly it is that we do, should
it be difficult for us to provide the other three things they wanted.)

I suppose if we're still going to be stuck with the outdated account
name, it's not worth doing, though.

> A solution that doesn't require PayPal would be ideal

Agreed.. kind of. Although I recognize that PayPal are not the nicest
company to deal with (I've had my fair share of problems with them in
the past), there's no other method as ubiquitous as PayPal to buy
stuff online if you don't have a credit card using a bank transaction.
(PayPal can direct-debit your bank account). Maybe if we were able to
take bank transfers directly somehow?

Is there anything /requiring/ us to use Guild banking? As far as I can
tell, the main advantage of using a Guild bank account is that there
are no fees -- but the complete lack of netbanking is a bit crap.
Maybe we could open a supplementary account with Westpac -- they might
have cheap accounts for non-profits, and even if they don't, interest
$1000 or so in the account for a year will make more than enough to
cover the fees. We often have a lot more than that much money, too, so
it would more than likely generate us a hundred dollars or so every
year.

> use the University's credit card interface but that needs a business unit
> and so on, so would need close cooperation with the Guild.

This sounds like the way to go as far as credit card payments are
concerned, although I don't know anything about the pros and cons of
'close cooperation with the Guild'.

> There's also a separate discussion here on whether allowing large-scale
> non-cash transactions with dispense is a good idea; arguably it's getting
> a little bit out of hand.

I don't think so, but perhaps this is something better put on the
ucc at ucc list. (In fact, it might be worth copying this whole email to
ucc at ucc, for the benefit of those who aren't subscribed to
committee at .)

--
Scott Young (splintax)
2008 UCC Treasurer