Write-In Campaign / SoA President-Elect

[JMO]

Originally Posted by tbakos

Thanks for the help but, I don't have a bias against the SoA. I've been a dues paying member for 40+ years and just now discovered I have a member number.

Really, I simply could not find it.

• Didn't notice the widget along the left side of the home page.
• When I got to Order History I didn't think to click on the order number.

Certainly, once you know the process it is easy - although a little time consuming and, you must admit, not intuitively obvious. It's like trying to find a boll weevil without knowing its habitat.

I will, if it comes to actually providing the number, outline the process and suggest a call or email to customer service as a last resort.

I did get a response from Rich Veys on this. He mentioned that the sole purpose was to distinguish between FSAs with the same name. I suggested if that was the purpose, then providing year of FSA, or Directory address might suffice and be way easier to get.

Slight tangent here. I just logged in to the Academy web page, and the first thing I see is my member number. Of course, it's not the same as my SOA member number, which I had to find by checking under Order History, because my exams were done well before the SOA even had a website.

If the SOA expects us to use our member number, they ought to make it a lot easier to find. Just sayin'

[tbakos]

Rich Veys was out early this week. I am still waiting for a response from him on this. He claims it is easy to find the "SoA member number" and it is (relatively) if one knows where to look and knows that "SoA ID" or "ID #" is what is being referred to. But, clearly, most would not know where to find it unless told.

However, the number is printed on the name tags we get at SoA meetings. It is not really a confidential ID number.

I suggested to Rich that there ought to be concern that requests that are received actually come from FSAs with clear distinctions between FSAs with similar names. There is also a need to accommodate electronic email requests. So, then the simplest way to achieve all of those goals is to accept requests via email only from an FSAs Directory email address. It is highly unlikely that anyone else could initiate an email from that account but the FSA and the email address satisfies the identification requirement for FSAs with similar names. Sending the email directly from the FSA to the SoA also eliminates the middleman and any security issues relevant to that.

By the way, the email address can only be changed (except, perhaps, for SoA Customer Service) by the FSA by logging into his/her SoA account using a User ID and password.

In any event, if they insist that the "SoA member number" be included on a "written" request, that can very easily be accommodated at the Annual Meeting. As noted, "SoA member number" is printed on the meeting name tag identified as "ID #" in recent years.

We are getting close.

[Brad Gile]

Originally Posted by tbakos

Rich Veys was out early this week. I am still waiting for a response from him on this. He claims it is easy to find the "SoA member number"
We are getting close.

Well, if it is so easy, why didn't Veys state for you just how anyone can find his/her member number?

[tbakos]

We should, at least, start with the premise that Veys was concerned about a real problem. Maybe he didn't know how to find what he called an "SoA member number".

I assume he doesn't have one since he is not a member and couldn't really test out how difficult or easy it might be to find. I imagine someone told him it existed and was unique to each member and, so, it seemed like an easy way to distinguish between similar sounding names.

Let's see if my suggestion to just use the member email address satisfies him as a reasonable and fair way to address his concerns.