[86] in APO Printshop
Re: Available payment options for letterpress jobs
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Leonard H. Tower Jr.)
Mon Mar 14 03:31:53 2005
Date: Mon, 14 Mar 2005 03:31:42 -0500 (EST)
From: tower@alum.mit.edu (Leonard H. Tower Jr.)
To: mitchb@MIT.EDU
CC: kchen@MIT.EDU, mitchb@MIT.EDU, alexmv@MIT.EDU, ccrazy@panix.com,
apo-printshop-journeyman@MIT.EDU, apo-printshop-manager@MIT.EDU,
apo-printshop-operators@MIT.EDU, apo-svp@MIT.EDU
In-reply-to: <200503122254.j2CMscxB015237@byte-me.mit.edu> (mitchb@MIT.EDU)
Reply-To: tower@alum.mit.edu
Mitch:
We have tried for the three and a half decades we have had the shop to
make decisions about it by consensus of all the qualified press ops
who are active members, or actively using the press shop. So they are
Cc:ed. And consult the whole Chapter when needed. And as the Press
Shop is part of the Service Program, the SVP is Cc:ed.
Mitch has also sent a general message about Tech Cash to apo-news. If
anyone want a copy, see the discuss archive:
http://diswww.mit.edu/charon/apo-news
or please reply to me alone, and I'll forward it.
My comments are after Mitch's message.
Date: Sat, 12 Mar 2005 17:54:38 -0500
From: Mitchell E Berger <mitchb@MIT.EDU>
cc: kchen@MIT.EDU, mitchb@MIT.EDU, alexmv@MIT.EDU, ccrazy@panix.com
Hi Len,
As you may or may not have heard, depending on whether you keep up
with chapter and/or exec minutes, Kevin and I have been working on
an endeavor this term for the Chapter to be able to accept TechCASH
as a payment option for its services. Potential uses include, but
are not necessarily limited to, Book Exchange, drop poster sales,
press jobs, silkscreened shirts, charity drives like Um0k and Big
Screw, and maybe even dues and debtlist payments.
These efforts have finally come to fruition, and as e-mail to
apo-news will soon explain, the contracts have been executed and on
Monday afternoon the hardware will be arriving and we'll be online
as an official TechCASH merchant.
Among the internal things we'll be doing as a result (now that all
the external red tape has been slashed to shreds) are updating the
drop poster sale slip so we can enforce late penalties by billing
TechCASH accounts rather than holding IDs as collateral, and
updating standing policies to reflect that new tact. Along the
way, Kevin also learned what's necessary for us to accept internal
MIT account transfers as payment for services, and we're allowed to
do that now as well.
In the current standing policies, the letterpress section contains:
"Payment. Only cash, check, or a Chapter Request for Payment is an
acceptable form of payment for jobs printed in the Letterpress
Shop; M.I.T. account transfers and other forms of payment are not
acceptable. No jobs shall leave the Letterpress Shop until
payment-in-full is received."
I was wondering if it would be okay with you for us to propose an
update to that standing policy at the chapter meeting on Wednesday
along with the drop poster edit along the lines of:
"Payment. Only cash, check, TechCASH, MIT internal account
transfer, or a Chapter Request for Payment is an acceptable form of
payment for jobs printed in the Letterpress Shop; other forms of
payment are not acceptable. No jobs shall leave the Letterpress
Shop until payment-in-full is received. In the case of MIT
internal account transfer, this requires that a document must be
received authorizing the transfer and signed by an authorized
representative of the purchasing group before the job leaves the
Letterpress shop."
This wouldn't necessarily mean that you have to immediately start
taking payments of those forms, but it would allow you to do so.
We'll provide the necessary training for how to take TechCASH for
all brothers and pledges who want it (this probably amounts to a
1-2 page handout and a 5-10 minute spiel with demo once we start
doing it).
It'd be really helpful if you're okay with this if you could let us
know so that we can let the attendees of the meeting on Wednesday
know that it has your endorsement.
Thanks very much,
Mitch
Hi Mitch et al.
1) It's not up to me as an alumnus to endorse or not this kind of
thing, but to provide what context I feel is useful. Actives should
make decisions about AX.
The part of the Letterpress Standing Policy you mentioned was meant to
shift load from the Treasurer to the Press Operators.
This made more sense the way the Press and Silkscreen Operations was
financially structured at first, but also was seen as part of being a
good brother. That is, it's a good thing to shift load off the
Treasurer.
Shifting the load, makes it more likely that each Treasurer closes hir
books, is seen on more service projects, etc.. In this case, to not
have the Treasurer be responsible for collecting press fees et al from
all comers. We also distinguished between "Service to the Chapter" -
a desirable thing, and "Service to an Individual Brother", which
should be not be expected/required of any brother, even an officer.
When AX doesn't understand this distinction, the Treasurer is often
overwhelmed.
If this is still the desire of AX's actives, using Tech Cash is OK,
but Inter-Account Transfers are not, as they need to be tracked, like
the debt lists of brothers (or other outstanding bills), and be
verified that the transfer actually happen. BTW, I was involved with
treasuring at AX, TCA, LSC, and The Tech, and back then, MIT
Accounting charged the wrong account about 10% of the time, and it
took a lot of effort - about a man hour an error back then - to
straighten it out. May or may not be better or worse, these days.
The fact that the current Treasurer is willing to deal with
Inter-Account Transfers does not mean that all future Treasurers will
be. Whether to apply the "KISS" engineering principle or not, is the
Active's decision. That is, to keep things simpler.
You might also want to consider whether it's better to shift
accounting load from those who buy things from AX to AX's Treasurer.
Also consider that Cash is now, but Credit may be never.
2) The Letterpress Shop also has a form that is filled out for each
job. It might need a change at the bottom to indicate Tech Cash,
etc. depending on what AX decides to do with collecting for
letterpress jobs.
Might be more economical to just rubber stamp all the current blank
forms on the bottom. Definitely kinder to the environment. And
revise them when the present stock runs out.
I have a stamp kit, I be willing to lend to AX.
3) It is probably wise to have all press operators trained in how to
use Tech Cash. Though it may not be wise to require Tech Cash
training to be qualified to use the Press.
yiLFS -len
