I have heartburn with the POLICY (not RULE) that no refund is given when a swimmer’s sixth event is dropped by the championship committee. When this policy is invoked, the affected swimmers are essentially taxed through no fault of their own or the meet host. I’m not familiar with any other type of event where a person pays to participate, is denied participation and is not returned the entry fee even though the event occurs.
Is there a reasonable reason why this policy exists?
Alka Selzer and Pepsid AC do a decent job on heartburn :)
I was not on the committee when the policy was made, but think about what it would take to refund the money. As I recall there is a very high percentage of the swimmers who will enter six events, somewhere around 40%. If checks were had to be issued to all of the swimmers for the last championships that would be 750 checks to be issued and accounted for.
Just think of what you would have to get to send out a check. First you have to get a list of every swimmer who entered six events. You have to find the address for each of those swimmers. Then you have to cut a check to each swimmer and perform the accounting controls to be sure that everything agrees.
After you issue the checks you have to account for all of those checks, what do you do if someone does not cash it? What about those checks that come back because of a bad address?
It has been my experience that after the meet, the meet hosts just want to account for everything then shut the organization down - the faster the better. If we had to issue checks to all the swimmers, that would take at a mimimum two months after the end of the meet to account for everything and most likely would take six months.
Who would be doing this accounting. USMS has depended on the volunteers for the organizaiton of its meets. How much time would be needed to cut the checks then account for them? Are we going to get a volunteer to do that. To hand cut 700 checks would take a couple of days. To account for them will take even more time.
OK, the meet makes an extra $3000 on events where the swimmer cannot swim in that event. We tell every meet entriant that you can have a chance to swim the sixth event if the the meet does not run too long. In order to have that chance, you will have to pay $4.00. It is the swimmers choice if he/she wants to take that chance. Most of the time we have been able to have the sixth event - a few of times we have not been able to run the sixth event. You pay your money, you get your ticket, you take your chance.
If it is upsetting to a competitor about taking the chance to swim the sixth event - just enter five.
michael
Alka Selzer and Pepsid AC do a decent job on heartburn :)
I was not on the committee when the policy was made, but think about what it would take to refund the money. As I recall there is a very high percentage of the swimmers who will enter six events, somewhere around 40%. If checks were had to be issued to all of the swimmers for the last championships that would be 750 checks to be issued and accounted for.
Just think of what you would have to get to send out a check. First you have to get a list of every swimmer who entered six events. You have to find the address for each of those swimmers. Then you have to cut a check to each swimmer and perform the accounting controls to be sure that everything agrees.
After you issue the checks you have to account for all of those checks, what do you do if someone does not cash it? What about those checks that come back because of a bad address?
It has been my experience that after the meet, the meet hosts just want to account for everything then shut the organization down - the faster the better. If we had to issue checks to all the swimmers, that would take at a mimimum two months after the end of the meet to account for everything and most likely would take six months.
Who would be doing this accounting. USMS has depended on the volunteers for the organizaiton of its meets. How much time would be needed to cut the checks then account for them? Are we going to get a volunteer to do that. To hand cut 700 checks would take a couple of days. To account for them will take even more time.
OK, the meet makes an extra $3000 on events where the swimmer cannot swim in that event. We tell every meet entriant that you can have a chance to swim the sixth event if the the meet does not run too long. In order to have that chance, you will have to pay $4.00. It is the swimmers choice if he/she wants to take that chance. Most of the time we have been able to have the sixth event - a few of times we have not been able to run the sixth event. You pay your money, you get your ticket, you take your chance.
If it is upsetting to a competitor about taking the chance to swim the sixth event - just enter five.
michael
