[Coworking] Re: Pausing membership?
Partial answer to your question. Here's what we do for pausing membership: PUTTING YOUR MEMBERSHIP ON HOLD Members with a 3-month or longer membership agreement can put their membership on hold for 2 weeks per 3-month agreement (that's 1 month for a 6-month agreement and 2 months for an annual agreement). There's a 2 week minimum per break. And of course you need to let a Locus manager know ahead of time. For simplicity and accounting purposes, you'll need to keep paying your monthly invoices according to the original contract, but you'll be able to continue using Locus at the end of your membership for no additional charge for the duration of the period that you put your membership on hold. Our space is not representative in that about 70% of the members are expatriates (from another country) and so the need for extended travel is common. People use this option A LOT. Best, Will On Monday, September 30, 2013 5:11:39 AM UTC+2, Alex Linsker wrote: Do you get requests from members to pause membership at your coworking place? Many of our members at Collective Agency travel a lot, some for several months or more at a time. What policies do you have with members quitting and rejoining, or pausing membership? Do any coworking places require a year lease, or is everywhere month-to-month, some with two months payment required up front? What do you do to increase the amount of time people stay members? Expressing appreciation to people for who/how they are, and having a vision for the place that's something big people can be part of and contribute to somehow, are two ways that work for us. I'm also interested in how much your members like variety in their life? Ours tend to like a lot. And how long your average member stays a member for less than 3 months? We get a percentage who are between jobs, or just moved to Portland and are looking for jobs. And for more than 2 years? We've had 16 people stay members for the past 2 years, out of 50 members currently. What are the main reasons people stop being members? Ours is members travel to another city, and after that, the top reason is getting a job at another company. Thanks, Alex -- Alex Linsker Collective Agency's Community Organizer / Proprietor (503) 517-6900 http://collectiveagency.co Tax and Conversation's Statewide Community Organizer (503) 369-9174 taxandconversation.com (503) 369-9174 mobile (503) 517-6901 fax 322 NW Sixth Ave, Suite 200, Portland, Oregon 97209 -- Visit this forum on the web at http://discuss.coworking.com --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Coworking group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to coworking+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
[Coworking] Re: Pausing membership?
Hi Alex, Our policy for putting memberships on hold is: *You may change your membership or put your membership on hold at any time with 30 days notice in writing or by email. There is a $15 processing fee for this service. Minimum hold time is one month; maximum is one year.* We have 4 sites, and people tend to leave for a variety of reasons: moving out of the area, getting a new job that requires them to be on site, startup growing beyond our capacity. We're month to month, but we give a discount for 6 month or 1 year commitments. We take it quite strongly that we're not an executive suite; we are flexible workspace. Means you're continually marketing, but you have a much bigger pool of potential members. On Monday, September 30, 2013 4:11:39 AM UTC+1, Alex Linsker wrote: Do you get requests from members to pause membership at your coworking place? Many of our members at Collective Agency travel a lot, some for several months or more at a time. What policies do you have with members quitting and rejoining, or pausing membership? Do any coworking places require a year lease, or is everywhere month-to-month, some with two months payment required up front? What do you do to increase the amount of time people stay members? Expressing appreciation to people for who/how they are, and having a vision for the place that's something big people can be part of and contribute to somehow, are two ways that work for us. I'm also interested in how much your members like variety in their life? Ours tend to like a lot. And how long your average member stays a member for less than 3 months? We get a percentage who are between jobs, or just moved to Portland and are looking for jobs. And for more than 2 years? We've had 16 people stay members for the past 2 years, out of 50 members currently. What are the main reasons people stop being members? Ours is members travel to another city, and after that, the top reason is getting a job at another company. Thanks, Alex -- Alex Linsker Collective Agency's Community Organizer / Proprietor (503) 517-6900 http://collectiveagency.co Tax and Conversation's Statewide Community Organizer (503) 369-9174 taxandconversation.com (503) 369-9174 mobile (503) 517-6901 fax 322 NW Sixth Ave, Suite 200, Portland, Oregon 97209 -- Visit this forum on the web at http://discuss.coworking.com --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Coworking group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to coworking+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
[Coworking] Re: Pausing membership?
I have a dirt cheap membership (20 - 40 euros a month depending on whethr you want me to handle yoru mail and visitors) available for folks who want to stay members or be in some way associated with us, but aren't using the space itself. It's the can't let go membership. :-) Several who have actually moved on to a full time office are nevertheless still members on this plan. It's also often an entry level membership, it's right up there with the punchcard for people who want to kick the tires. As the businesses growm they generally move on to other kids of membership. If folks want to leave their stuff here and so forth -- I have a member now who is off for a Habitat-like-thingie in Nepal for three months -- I give them half off or something similar. I have one member who is regularly out of country he sends his bookkeeper here to do his work while he is gone. Our philosophy is that you pay for what you use, and not for what you don't. So each situation is different but we have these options available. Jeannine On Monday, September 30, 2013 5:11:39 AM UTC+2, Alex Linsker wrote: Do you get requests from members to pause membership at your coworking place? Many of our members at Collective Agency travel a lot, some for several months or more at a time. What policies do you have with members quitting and rejoining, or pausing membership? Do any coworking places require a year lease, or is everywhere month-to-month, some with two months payment required up front? What do you do to increase the amount of time people stay members? Expressing appreciation to people for who/how they are, and having a vision for the place that's something big people can be part of and contribute to somehow, are two ways that work for us. I'm also interested in how much your members like variety in their life? Ours tend to like a lot. And how long your average member stays a member for less than 3 months? We get a percentage who are between jobs, or just moved to Portland and are looking for jobs. And for more than 2 years? We've had 16 people stay members for the past 2 years, out of 50 members currently. What are the main reasons people stop being members? Ours is members travel to another city, and after that, the top reason is getting a job at another company. Thanks, Alex -- Alex Linsker Collective Agency's Community Organizer / Proprietor (503) 517-6900 http://collectiveagency.co Tax and Conversation's Statewide Community Organizer (503) 369-9174 taxandconversation.com (503) 369-9174 mobile (503) 517-6901 fax 322 NW Sixth Ave, Suite 200, Portland, Oregon 97209 -- Visit this forum on the web at http://discuss.coworking.com --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Coworking group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to coworking+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
[Coworking] Re: Pausing membership?
Geez, sorry about the typos. My keyboard is getting old, I need to replace it. :-) On Monday, September 30, 2013 11:50:45 AM UTC+2, Jeannine wrote: I have a dirt cheap membership (20 - 40 euros a month depending on whethr you want me to handle yoru mail and visitors) available for folks who want to stay members or be in some way associated with us, but aren't using the space itself. It's the can't let go membership. :-) Several who have actually moved on to a full time office are nevertheless still members on this plan. It's also often an entry level membership, it's right up there with the punchcard for people who want to kick the tires. As the businesses growm they generally move on to other kids of membership. If folks want to leave their stuff here and so forth -- I have a member now who is off for a Habitat-like-thingie in Nepal for three months -- I give them half off or something similar. I have one member who is regularly out of country he sends his bookkeeper here to do his work while he is gone. Our philosophy is that you pay for what you use, and not for what you don't. So each situation is different but we have these options available. Jeannine -- Visit this forum on the web at http://discuss.coworking.com --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Coworking group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to coworking+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
Re: [Coworking] Pausing membership?
I should really dig into all the data we have in Nadine and find answers to your specific questions but I'm going to answer off the cuff for now. Some members switch a lot, some members don't switch much at all. We do everything month-to-month and we bill on the day you sign up and on that date every month. Our only rule is that you need to tell us of any changes before your billing date. If someone misses the date we don't issue refunds but do offer a credit for that amount in the next few months if they want to come back. This simple system has worked out great for us. Nadine is the system we use to manage all of this and I've shown many people how it looks from the back end. Often I get asked why we don't let members change their membership from within Nadine and that's because we want to have a conversation with folks when they are changing things up or leaving. We've already greatly simplified how everything works so it's not much of an inconvenience to send us an email or come up to the front desk. I can pull actual numbers sometime soon. We have lots of data to play with. :) Jacob --- Office Nomads - Individuality without Isolation http://www.officenomads.com - (206) 323-6500 On Sun, Sep 29, 2013 at 8:11 PM, Alex Linsker alexlins...@gmail.com wrote: Do you get requests from members to pause membership at your coworking place? Many of our members at Collective Agency travel a lot, some for several months or more at a time. What policies do you have with members quitting and rejoining, or pausing membership? Do any coworking places require a year lease, or is everywhere month-to-month, some with two months payment required up front? What do you do to increase the amount of time people stay members? Expressing appreciation to people for who/how they are, and having a vision for the place that's something big people can be part of and contribute to somehow, are two ways that work for us. I'm also interested in how much your members like variety in their life? Ours tend to like a lot. And how long your average member stays a member for less than 3 months? We get a percentage who are between jobs, or just moved to Portland and are looking for jobs. And for more than 2 years? We've had 16 people stay members for the past 2 years, out of 50 members currently. What are the main reasons people stop being members? Ours is members travel to another city, and after that, the top reason is getting a job at another company. Thanks, Alex -- Alex Linsker Collective Agency's Community Organizer / Proprietor (503) 517-6900 http://collectiveagency.co Tax and Conversation's Statewide Community Organizer (503) 369-9174 taxandconversation.com (503) 369-9174 mobile (503) 517-6901 fax 322 NW Sixth Ave, Suite 200, Portland, Oregon 97209 -- Visit this forum on the web at http://discuss.coworking.com --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Coworking group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to coworking+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out. -- Visit this forum on the web at http://discuss.coworking.com --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Coworking group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to coworking+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
Re: [Coworking] Pausing membership?
There's a lot of great ideas in this thread, I'm taking notes - thanks y'all. At Indy Hall, we allow for pausing of a membership with the same notice that we require for canceling: 30 days. Naturally, not everyone will give 30 days notice. To minimize the impact on cashflow, upon signup we collect a deposit that's equal to the level of membership the person is enrolling in. ($175 month membership = $175 deposit). When people upgrade, we upgrade their deposit. We explain that this deposit is in lieu of any formal contracts, allowing them to flexibly stay at Indy Hall month to month. MOST people change very little. As some of you have noted, some change a lot. Somewhat like Jeannine, it's more common that members downgrade to our basic membership to help them stay connected to the community when they're not here. In all cases, if someone gives us 30 days minimum notice of their membership change, we happily refund that deposit. If they do not give notice, we keep the deposit to help support cashflow. Internally, this gives us a month before losing a member impacts our bottom line...and ideally, we're adding more members each month than we're losing. Net effect: cashflow stays positive with minimal impact on everyone. We do whatever we can to change a cancel/pause into a downgrade. One thing we didn't do before recently was keeping track of paused memberships effectively - and making sure we follow up. Pausing is only pausing if they actually come back :) It should be obvious, but this is the #1 mistake I see in any business, not just coworking. Unmanaged cashflow can (and probably will) kill you. Related sidenote: there are some seasonal things you should plan for. Summertime and holidays are generally when we see the most downgrades. Our cancel reasons have also yielded a lot of interesting data in the last year and a half, with some dramatic changes compared to the years prior. I'll have more to share on that soon. -Alex -- /ah indyhall.org coworking in philadelphia On Sun, Sep 29, 2013 at 11:11 PM, Alex Linsker alexlins...@gmail.comwrote: Do you get requests from members to pause membership at your coworking place? Many of our members at Collective Agency travel a lot, some for several months or more at a time. What policies do you have with members quitting and rejoining, or pausing membership? Do any coworking places require a year lease, or is everywhere month-to-month, some with two months payment required up front? What do you do to increase the amount of time people stay members? Expressing appreciation to people for who/how they are, and having a vision for the place that's something big people can be part of and contribute to somehow, are two ways that work for us. I'm also interested in how much your members like variety in their life? Ours tend to like a lot. And how long your average member stays a member for less than 3 months? We get a percentage who are between jobs, or just moved to Portland and are looking for jobs. And for more than 2 years? We've had 16 people stay members for the past 2 years, out of 50 members currently. What are the main reasons people stop being members? Ours is members travel to another city, and after that, the top reason is getting a job at another company. Thanks, Alex -- Alex Linsker Collective Agency's Community Organizer / Proprietor (503) 517-6900 http://collectiveagency.co Tax and Conversation's Statewide Community Organizer (503) 369-9174 taxandconversation.com (503) 369-9174 mobile (503) 517-6901 fax 322 NW Sixth Ave, Suite 200, Portland, Oregon 97209 -- Visit this forum on the web at http://discuss.coworking.com --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Coworking group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to coworking+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out. -- Visit this forum on the web at http://discuss.coworking.com --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Coworking group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to coworking+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
