Minutes of meeting of the Board of directors of The Autscape Organisation Meeting date: Sunday 15th December 2013 Meeting time: 2.00pm GMT Meeting Chair: Martijn Present: Alastair, Elaine, Liz, Martijn, Peter, Stephen Apologies: Trish 1. Ratifications None. 2. Announcements 2.1. Yo retired from the Autscape board as of the 22nd of November 2013. The board took the opportunity to respond as follows: "The Autscape organisation would like to thank Yo for her years of service to Autscape. She has made a massive difference to the organisation, leading its incorporation as a registered charity, and we will now do our best to maintain and build on the structure she left. We're looking forward to seeing her at Autscape, and we all wish her the very best!" The board members, as individuals, were invited to contribute towards a gift card. 3. Proposals 3.1. Meeting schedule. The board considered a proposal that Autscape changes the meeting schedule to either A) hold a formal board meeting every 2 months with the other month being a meeting specifically for discussions of bigger issues, or B) hold a meeting for discussing things a week prior to the board meeting. The rationale for this proposal is in appendix A. Option A was considered too infrequent for formal decisions, and therefore formal meetings, in busier times. There was a lengthy discussion was had of the possible merits of B, if it would result in too much time commitments, and how effective the use of the board list currently. No formal resolution was made, but it was agreed to try and get more frequent contact outside of the context of formal meetings and the board list going. Debbie arrived during item 3.1. Now present: Alastair, Debbie, Elaine, Liz, Martijn, Peter, Stephen 3.2. Fidelity insurance. The board considered a proposal that Autscape extends its insurance cover to include fidelity insurance. Peter agreed to get an estimate of what Fidelity insurance would cost us. 3.2 was deferred to next meeting pending estimate of additional cost. 3.3. Venue size. Proposal: The board makes a decision regarding the potential size of the 2015 venue. This is needed so that the research subcommittee knows what it is researching. Following a prolonged discussion trying to ascertain what a reasonable amount of growth for Autscape is, involving venue sizes we were likely to be able to find, minimum bookings, previous year on year growth, a consensus formed that a venue accommodating about 150 people would be a reasonable amount to search for if growth was desired. This was deferred to the next meeting on the understanding that we are waiting for Liz to have a better idea on fundraising, that cheap venues of the 150 mark are difficult to find and that Debbie cannot easily research venues between Easter and mid June. 4. Follow ups 4.1. Postal address. Debbie explained that researching mail solutions hit a glitch, which Peter summarised as being that there are products that nearly do the right thing, but they charge separately for each person's name written above the Autscape address. People who write to us don't follow instructions exactly, and they can unwittingly cause us to reach the limit of the number of free names. Responses back from the company Debbie is looking at are very slow, and that the time taken to find out what the product is is dragging on and on. A brief discussion followed regarding possible alternative solutions, with no immediate conclusion. 4.2. Updating information 4.2.1. Charities Commission 4.2.2. Companies House 4.2.3. CRB Checks Debbie reported that she is awaiting the password from Yo for 4.2.1 and 4.2.2, and suggested that two people have this password in future. Elaine agreed to handle CRB checks for those who need them for 4.2.3. 5. Role reports 5.1. Chair. Martijn had nothing to report, but apologised for his recent inactivity. 5.2. Treasurer/Outgoing Interim Treasurer. Stephen stated he had been very fatigued the past month and hadn't managed to get anything he was intending on getting done at the last meeting done. Handover with Peter hadn't begun yet. He asked if Peter had sent the receipt we'd been requested yet, and stated that if not one of them needed to get that sorted after today's meeting. Peter agreed to do the receipt, and requested that Stephen prioritise expense claims for Yo and Kalen if Kalen had any. Stephen agreed to prioritise expense claims. 5.3. Stand in company secretary for November - December. Debbie reported that nothing had been done, as per 4.2.1 and 4.2.2. 5.4. Venue co-ordinator. Elaine had nothing to report. 5.5. Web systems. Martijn had nothing to report. 6. Subcommittee, working group and any other reports 6.1. Formal Programme subcommittee. Martijn reported that discussion on conference theme had been restarted on the Plan list. He's going to aim at putting a shortlist to the board for a vote soon. It'll have to be on list because he doesn't want to wait for the next meeting. After that he'll work on getting the Call for Proposals out ASAP. 6.2. Alternative Programme subcommittee. Trish wasn't here, and Martijn wasn't aware of any recent activity. 6.3. Fundraising subcommittee. Liz reported that earlier this month, Elaine raised the possibility of Autscape signing up to websites that give commission to a chosen charity if you shop via them (on thousands of sites like Amazon, Next, B&Q, etc.). This one won the 2013 Award for Best Giving Platform http://www.giveasyoulive.com. She's done a bit of research (not quite read the small print yet) but she wanted to know whether board members would be happy for her to pursue this. As Elaine said, Autscape has the potential to raise money from board members (who, like her, regularly buy from places like Amazon) and our membership. A brief discussion came up about if there were any potential issues that would require this sort of thing to go through the board, and Peter volunteered to check the M&A for rules on accepting donations, while the meeting continued due to lack of time. He completed this check during the meeting and the results are reported under 9.1 below. 6.4. Research subcommittee. Debbie had nothing to report. 6.5. Publicity and Publications subcommittee. Alastair had nothing to report. 6.6. Purchasing working group. Elaine had nothing to report. 7. Any other business There was no AOB for the open portion of the meeting.
The next part of the meeting was closed to the members. 8. Key positions to be filled. 8.1. Company Secretary. Alastair said that his potential company secretary hadn't mentioned anything since he passed the information to her. As such, the board discussed how to continue: A) pay for services; B) ask Debbie to take on the role of company secretary, but not honorary secretary; C) otherwise appoint from inside the board; D) give up searching and agree that company secretary tasks will be distributed. Debbie indicated she would be willing, under B), on the provision that she gave up the position of Research subcommittee chair. Elaine and Stephen both volunteered to do the Research SC should Debbie become company secretary, and it was agreed that some tasks involved in the role of company secretary could be delegated as long as we had one person with the responsibility. This resulted in the following decisions: 8.1.1. The board elected Debbie as Company Secretary (7 for). 8.1.2. The board elected Peter as chair of the Research subcommittee (5 for). 8.2. Honorary Secretary. The board elected Stephen as Honorary Secretary (6 for). The closed portion of the meeting ended, and another open portion began.
9. Any other business 9.1. Donations. Peter could not find anything stopping Liz from signing Autscape up to a donations scheme (Item 6.3), provided it is not a matter "likely to significantly impact on the company's reputation." However, he pointed Liz to Appendix D of the June 2011 meeting which, while not describing the same situation, did address interesting points which are worth considering. 9.2. Third-party use of Autscape-written guidelines. Elaine forwarded a request to use our Chat list guidance for a group unrelated to Autscape if the references to Autscape was changed and we were given credit. There were no objections to this, but emphasis was made that we weren't endorsing it, and it was suggested to request that she point out that we weren't endorsing it while crediting us. Meeting closed 16:30