EAST REGION HOCKEY ASSOCIATION
Honorary Treasurer’s Report – AGM 3rd July 2008
Balance Sheet and statement of accounts for 2007/8
The accounts are not yet audited.
The income and expenditure account (Table 2) shows a deficit of £2525.75 for general activities and an excess of £1176.21 for the camps.
The level of the deficit should not be of concern with the current reserves but future income and expenditure should continue to be monitored to ensure an acceptable level of reserves - about £35,000.
Areas of concern in 2007/8
· The claims from East umpires appointed to men’s Premier A and B and women’s Premier Divisions matches continue to exceed the fees paid by the teams. (Item 2a)
· The large deficit from the Senior Indoor Competitions caused by extremely high umpires’ expenses. (Item 3a) This activity receives an ERHA £300 subsidy from the and will continue to be subsidised in 2008/9. The budget set for umpires expenses for the 2008/9 competitions is to be strictly monitored and kept to.
· Over budget net expenditure on the girls’ U17 squad due to late collection of players’ fees for the Regional Tournament.
· Increased expenditure on administration (item 4). Large proportion of this increase is due to extra meetings being held to discuss amongst other topics the Single System, handover payment of umpires’ expenses to the ERHUA and financing of the RYUAG.
Senior and Main Activities
The League continues to be self-financing and this year was able to reduce its entry fee after gaining a 3-year sponsorship deal from NE14Hockey. Thanks to the League for their contribution of half the costs of the Handbook. Also for continuing to use their income from fines to support young umpires expenditure – this year shirts.
It is pleasing that the overall cost of producing the Handbook (Item 6) decreased slightly this year and thanks go to Trevor Williams for the efficient preparation of this.
Coaching and Youth
All Regional squads expenditures were within budget apart from the U17 girls’ mentioned above. (Subsidies given to squads are £600 for U14 boys and £800/squad for U15 and U17 girls and boys)
Last year’s high expenditure on squad kit resulted in a much lower expenditure this year. (item 8a).
The youth Indoor competitions received a £500 subsidy and medals from the MAN Group sponsorship obtained by England Hockey and also a £300 subsidy from the ERHA. Thanks to Bedford School who did not charge for the use of their Sports Hall for the boys’ U16 competition.
The MAN Group sponsorship also provided medals for other schools competitions.
All this sponsorship helped reduce the entry fees to youth competitions.
The Association continues to part fund accommodation for the young umpires training held at the minis (item 11) and has also agreed to finance the administrative expenses for the Youth Panel (item 12).
Affiliated schools and clubs
The number of schools affiliating continues to drop (item 13) – approximately 30 less this year, though the number of club teams affiliating (item 14a) has risen by about 10.
Youth Performance and Camps
Last year’s camps showed excess income of £2320.92 (item 16a), £605 of which was from commission on the sale of kit and £150 an incentive payment from the Inland Revenue for filing the end of year tax return on line. The excess is being used to fund a Performance Group administrator one of whose responsibilities is to administrate the camps.
Affiliation fees for 2008/9
The Association’s accounts are healthy and on the assumption that there will be little change in the Association’s activities in 2008/9, I see no reason to increase either the club or school affiliation fees. These will remain at £15/adult team and £7/school. An increase may be needed in 2009/10.
2008/9
During 2007/8 East Management agreed to finance the following from the reserves :
· Development of the ERHUA Website to include a section for Young Umpires allowing them to claim as well as protecting the details of young umpires using the site – cost £1520.
· Modernising the ERHUA Website and adding a section to allow assessors and coaches to enter full assessment reports on to the system. ERHA to pay half the cost – ERHA contribution £680.
· Start-up costs for the Regional Young Umpires Action Group (RYUAG) - £1345.
· Purchase of a laptop computer for the Camps administration – maximum cost £500.
This expenditure will appear in the 2008/9 accounts.
The Association will continue to give a £300 subsidy to each of the Senior and Youth Indoor competitions.
Mileage rate will be increased from 16p/mile to 22p/mile to reflect the increase in petrol costs which will unfortunately increase costs to the Association and participants in East events.
The introduction of the Single System may have a knock-on effect on the Region’s expenditure on Performance activities (previously expenditure on Regional squads) but currently it is assumed that the cost to the ERHA will remain as at present. This may change as more is known about the System.
Payment of all umpires claims and other expenditure from ERHUA activities will be transferred from the ERHA Honorary Treasurer to the ERHUA Treasurer. The latter will prepare a budget for the ERHA and invoice the ERHA for relevant costs at the end of the financial year. This transfer will reduce my work and increase drastically the work of the ERHUA Treasurer but will have the advantage of making the ERHUA and its members more aware of and responsible for the cost of their activities.
Thanks
My thanks to Mr David Hobbs for auditing the accounts, to County Treasurers for collecting the affiliation fees , to squad managers and budget officers of the East League and Youth Competitions Committees for preparing budgets and collecting and paying in monies and to East Management for their continued support. Their help is appreciated.
Margaret McCall
Honorary Treasurer
East Region Hockey Association
27/6/2008