Treasurer and Registration Coordinator

As Treasurer, you are primarily responsible for tracking all incoming and outflowing monies, keeping an eye on the budget and accounting. You may be responsible for both depositing and writing checks, although the Registration Coordinator should be the one depositing the registration and merchandise checks, and people in charge of various aspects of the con that will incur expenses (Merchandise and Incidentals, Art Show Panels, Advertising, etc) may be handling the purchasing themselves- after clearing the cost with you, of course. Possibly every staff member will instead hand over the payment info and total to you and it will be your responsibility to see that it is paid for; as long as you have the numbers and know for sure how much is in the bank, either way works. It's something you will want to work out with your staff very early on- much like the con budget.

You are in charge of laying out and mainting the budget, and letting the rest of the staff know when their wants conflict with what is available. If they want something badly enough (fancier badge styles, twenty gallons of ice cream for a panel, Jeff Bennet...) they have the choice of paying of it out of their own pocket. If enough money has been brought in at the end of the con to pay them back, do so. If the con does not, make sure they keep their receipts and an itemized list of what Convention Supplies they paid for- they may have the option of writing it off on their taxes and getting a percentage of it back. I have done my best to compile and list prices for the basics- and some fripperies- of what your con will need to pay for. Please see the "Budget" section of CP 101 for more details.

As Registration Coordinator, you are primarily responsible for tracking every registration and merchandise sale that is made, seeing to it that the funds acquired are deposited in the Gathering Bank Account, and confirming with people that their registration has been processed after their payment has cleared. You are also responsible for anwsering any questions pertaining to registration - "Have I bought this? Am I registered for banquet?" that show up in the con email. You are the one to whom the Gathering Registration Address points- you may want to set up a Post Office Box rather than use your home address. This needs to be worked out early on so that registration for your convention can open as soon as the current year's con has ended. You are responsible for updating the list of "confirmed" (ie, "paid up") registrants about once a month.

There are typically two ways of registering- regular mail and online registration- and two typical ways of paying as well- check or paypal, and if paypal preferably a paypal merchant account that allows you to accept credit card payments. This will cost you a bit extra than a regular paypal account, but being able to accept credit cards helps a lot- since having a separate system set up for handling credit cards, like through Quickbooks, is more trouble than it is worth. For one, most people will ignore your listing of "paypal - cash only" as an option, and try to pay you with a credit card through paypal anyway. While paypal charges you a slightly higher percent for use of credit cards than a separate credit system does, the amount you save probably won't match the $40 a month you have to pay to keep a separate means of billing credit cards open. Plus, if you're using Quickbooks- which is a useful tool, but I'm not sure I would recommend it as it is far more complicated than a small con like the Gathering needs- or if only one person can run the credit cards, it's a lot more difficult to have someone step in and take over than it is to get someone to sub for clicking "accept payment" in paypal or depositing a check. Keep it simple- check or paypal.

It's your duty as Treasurer to set up a bank account and merchant paypal account for your con- you need an account open in the name of your coorporation, the name that people will be writing checks to; they can't go to someone's personal bank account. Possibly your con chair will already have arranged for both, in which case, you need to acquire all the relevant info- bank account number, checks and deposit slips, credit card if one is attached to the account- from your con chair. Check to see if anything has been done to set up the financial side of the con before running out and possibly creating a superfluous second account. Bank of America is fine, as well as having locations everywhere. Make sure you understand and account for any bank-related fees your con is responsible for.

If you are already on staff by the time of the con- which hopefully you will be, since all the banking concerns should be handled before pre-registration on site at the current year's con starts- you are in charge of tallying, taking and depositing all checks and cash received and depositing them. If you are- as I recommend doing for a number of reasons- both Treasurer and in charge of Registrations, you are also responsible for all the Registration Forms from on-site pre-reg as well. Take them home, and type them up into first one file that keeps all the info together, and then convenient spreadsheets. EXCEL IS YOUR GOOD FRIEND. Learn the math/finance related functionalities of it. Trust me, you will come to be thankful you set up such spreadsheets from the start.

Example:

* veg = vegitarian or vegan, check your "special needs" page for a short list of anyone who has noted that they have special needs of any kind. p = upright artshow panels, t - artshow tables. *

Pretty much everything but shirts and art panels you can just go off this list- provided you double-check to make sure you've tallied everything up correctly. Don't forget to include Staff, Guest, and mail-out merchandise orders!! Oh, and any decent program that auto-tallies your numbers is a plus.

Shirts- You need a column to list out the numbers you need of each size, and you're going to want to have a separate page that lists the names by shirt size. Start with the smalls, go through your chart and list the name (badge name, whichever) of everyone who is supposed to get one of that size.Depending how type-A you are, you can either set it up at the start and keep it updated as the year goes along, or, you can just wait until the date you need to hand all the numbers over to your Merchandise Coordinator and tally it all then.

Then you look at your size totals, and decide if you want additional shirts to sell at the con. We've done the following:
S – 8 (+ 2 to sell at the con = 10)
M – 24 (+ 6 to sell at the con = 30)
L – 27 (+ 10 to sell at the con = 38)
XL – 34 (+ 12 to sell at the con = 46)
2xl – 6 (+ 2 to sell at the con = 8)
3xl – 3
Subtotal = 102, + (the subtotal of any additional shirts you want to try to sell at the con) = Total

You'll need to make sure that the Merchandise Coordinator keeps you updated on the deadlines at which he will need your totals for; you in turn must give him the totals for said merchandise on that deadline, and clarify if your number is only the total for pre-paid merchandise, or if it includes an amount to sell on site. This way, your Merchandise Coordinator won't tack on the 40 on-site sales extras that *you* had already included in your total. Also, you may want to keep him updated on how well individual items are selling as the year turns; it may effect how much has been budgeted for that item. (For one, really poor sales may mean less production cost overall, but really good sales might bring you past a bracket that lowers the cost per item; ie, 1 - 50 copies of product Y are $10 per copy, 50 - 75 copies of product Y are $8.50 per copy, 75 - 100 copies of product Y are $5.00 a copy, etc.)

You are responsible for updating the Head of the Art Show with any info relevant to Art Show sales- who bought a space, how many and of what type, and their email address- as they come in. The Art Head is responsible for all details that come after that.

You need to keep a separate page - a text or word document will do- that lists all of individual's special needs. Some people just may need a special vegan or vegitarian or kosher meal; some people may be hearing or visually impaired and request a large-font con booklet or a helper at the con to make sure they don't miss something important. We don't typically get many of these in, but even if it's just one person, you are responsible for seeing to it that their problem is accounted for- or, to inform them that the con is unable to supply the help they need if that is the case.

Another separate page for just mail-out orders (for both people who order merchandise knowing they cannot come to the con, and people who pre-register but can't make it but whom are still owed merchandise).

If con packets are being assembled at the convention, you are responsible for having a print-out (you may want to delete the legal names from the version of the spreadsheet you print) to show who bought what and help make up the registration packets. Remember, con packets can be assembled in a staff member's home before the con- if it is the home of the Merchandise Coordinator, you need to make sure he has a copy of your files that is easy to understand (like a spreadsheet). If you are doing the assembly work yourself, you need to make sure all the merchandise is shipped to you in good time, and if a third party is doing it, they're going to need both info and items. I reccomend that whoever puts the con packets together does so in driving distance from the con if not the con itself- simple logic, but sometimes the simple things are the ones you miss easily. If you are handling putting together the con packets, you may also be responsible for assembling individual badges as well. Please see the "Budget" section for what putting together both con packets and badges physically entails. It doesn't matter if you do it or another staffer does it- as long as it gets done.

You are responsible for seeing to it that there are Registration Forms printed out for Walk-In attendees at the con; you are also responsible for collecting these forms at the end of the con for the posterity of having actual final attendee numbers for your convention. (You may want to check the merchandise records as well, for the same reason, which you'll be needing to do anyway as Treasurer as part of post-con clean-up.)

On site, you are the most logical choice to man shifts at the Registration Desk- but you are not responsible for doing so by yourself. Two people should be at the desk at all times, and you do not always have to be one of them- your fellow staff members or trusted volunteers ought to be taking turns helping out there as well.