Minutes of the Hospice Lotteries Association Regional Meeting

Minutes of the Hospice Lotteries Association Regional Meeting 10 th June 2015, Hope House Childrens Hospice, Oswestry

Those Present:

Carol Twomey Severn Hospice Carol Varey Willow Brook Hospice Yvonne Mallett Severn Hospice Debbie Munro Willow Brook Hospice Lin Peters Severn Hospice Donna Adams Douglas Macmillan Sarah Bedry Prospect House Kelly Rusby Douglas Macmillan Helen Legge St Michael Hospice Gillian Nove Claire House Childrens Hospice Ann Panniers St Michael Hospice Liz Singleton LOROS Kris Broome St David’s Hospice Chris Routley Hospicecare Care Christine Vorres St David’s Hospice David Pitt Rowcroft Hospice Care Charlotte Schofield Mary Stevens Hospice Simi Epstein Hope House Childrens Hospice Lisa Hadley Katherine House Mike Coulson Hope House Childrens Hospice Sarah Hulson Katherine House Sarah Hughes Hope House Childrens Hospice Beech Carl Bayliss TLC Paul Marsh East Cheshire Hospice Julie Hughes St David’s Hospice Belinda Ellis Hospice Lottery Partnership Alison Jerram St Giles Hospice

Welcome from Simi Epstein, Hope House Children’s Hospice. The minutes of the last meeting were agreed as a true record and there are no matters arising.

Chairman’s Report:

The Board currently has a full compliment of Directors. David Pitt will be retiring from Rowcroft Hospice in 4 weeks and therefore will be leaving his position of Vice Chair and Treasurer. Charlotte Schofield will be taking over as Treasurer with a short interim handover before David leaves. The Board are aware of a lack of communication from the HLA. The email addresses are taken from the website and these are causing a lot of bounce backs which may be due to information not being updated when staff leave. This is being addressed as a matter of urgency. A new Facebook Group is under development and hopefully a lot of the problems will be solved with the new HLA website. Douglas Macmillan offered the services of a member of their team to communicate with HLA members and update contact details for each Hospice. Chris Routley and Donna Adams will have a conversation about this outside of the meeting.

Treasurer’s Report:

DP reported that currently we have just over £10k in the General Account and £51,574 in the Conference Account. Seven hospices still have not paid their annual subscription and DP is going to contact all of these ______Chairman Vice Chairman Treasurer Directors Chris Routley Charlotte Schofield Anthony Lord, Liz Singleton, Eric Russell, Carmel Hudson, Simi Epstein, Carl Bayliss, Richard Davies by telephone before he leaves in 4 weeks. He will highlight the importance of being a member of the HLA as they make a donation of £500 to Gamcare each year on behalf of Hospices.

Lotteries Council:

The relationship with the LC is unchanged – a member of their Board is invited to one of the HLA Board meetings when appropriate and a member of the HLA Board attends the LC Board meetings. The LC increased their annual subscription by £100/yr and this was received very negatively mainly because the communication was very poor. The HLA had been asked to support the LC is objecting to the classification of umbrella lotteries in the DCMS report however the Board felt this was of no advantage to Hospice Lotteries and therefore decided not to support their communication.

Conference Report:

Invitations to the Conference have now been sent out and forms need to be sent back before July 1st to qualify for the early bird discount. A draft agenda is now ready to be advertised and will be sent out to members. Katie Walton currently looks after the delegate bookings for the conference but she will be leaving at the end of the month so a new member is needed to join the team. Please call Julie Hughes at St David’s Hospice if you feel you may be able to support.

Website:

HLA is going to have a new website which will be funded by the surplus in the general account. A draft proposal has been received from Matt Haworth, Reason Digital but currently this is slightly above the specification that we require. Members suggested that the new website requires: - Area to update contact details

- Payment option for subs/events (conference & regional meetings)

- Link to websites for individual hospices

Microsite:

The final brief that we now have is very close to the original spec even though we have fewer people taking part than originally anticipated. The deadline to participate is imminent so if Hospices wish to take part they need to contact Ben White at Reason Digital asap.

Response to DCMS:

Findings by the committee: ______Chairman Vice Chairman Treasurer Directors Chris Routley Charlotte Schofield Anthony Lord, Liz Singleton, Eric Russell, Carmel Hudson, Simi Epstein, Carl Bayliss, Richard Davies - 20% boundary remains as they do not see any merit in increasing this. It can be aggregated over 3 years for start up lotteries

- 35% cap on expenses for larger lotteries (not specific about “large”), this may impact on umbrella lotteries in the future

- A new category for umbrella lotteries (one organisation with multiple lotteries), no definition as of yet

- Consideration of increasing prize limits of all society lotteries The HLA have decided not to support the LC in arguing the classification of umbrella lotteries as this was felt to be hypocritical.

Scratch cards:

3 attendees already promote scratch cards within their lottery - Sales figures presented as below from 2 hospices:

LOROS Douglas Macmillan 100,000 cards for a 2 ½ year game Sell: £32,500 at events Sell: £5,000 in Day Hospice £4,000 at outlets £1000 at Christmas Ball each year £14,000 in shops £5000 in wedding favours

The GC will allow on extension on games as long as all supporters are notified.

Direct debits:

A discussion took place regarding how much to take per month to ensure that players do not drop out of the draw during 5 week months or years with 53 Fridays.

Should we take £5 per month? Should the overpayment be taken as a donation at the end of the year or could extra tickets be allocated for the Christmas draw?

Donna Adams told the group that they take £5 monthly and their Donorflex software automatically process the donation of the change.

Chris Routley stated that he had adjusted his terms and conditions and has reserved the right to delay the draw to allow for the uploading of a late DD file. He checks the DD reports and knows when he needs to delay the draw. It is ok to do this providing it is covered by T&Cs. This would be classed as exceptional circumstances. Possibly change T&Cs to say ‘you will be in every draw that we receive payment for’ rather than just ‘will be in every draw’.

Carol Twomey says that at Severn Hospice they defer the start date for new players until the second payment is received so that players are in the draw continuously once they start playing. GC are happy with this. Some

______Chairman Vice Chairman Treasurer Directors Chris Routley Charlotte Schofield Anthony Lord, Liz Singleton, Eric Russell, Carmel Hudson, Simi Epstein, Carl Bayliss, Richard Davies take £6.34 for first payment but this doesn’t always guarantee entry into every draw and this could cause problems if a rollover is in place.

Internal audits:

Debbie Munroe asked what internal audit measures hospices take to ensure that staff are not fraudulent?

Telephone calls are made to players to ask how much they paid, whether the representative was presentable and polite etc. Several suggestions followed such as:

- Telephone all cash collection non paids and cancelleds each week.

- A spare collector can be used to sweep up non paids and double check that they haven’t paid but been marked incorrectly.

- Does a double check need to be made on those who have paid to ensure that money collected isn’t being drip fed in 4 weekly?

- Ask collectors to record on the round sheet whether someone is in hospital, on holiday, can’t afford to pay etc. and check this during telephone calls.

- Leave a note through the door to say that a call has been made.

- Get signatures from all cancelled players. Decaid:

The benchmarking exercise being conducted by Decaid through the LC was discussed regarding the amount of time it takes to produce the data required. Decaid came to the HLA with this proposal but it was declined.

Good ideas/Questions:

1. Does social media actually generate more members? Donna Adams mentioned that they took out an ad for £50 on Facebook which generated 300 new members. Must identify who you want to attract – over 16 years old, female etc. It was generally felt it was a good idea to use videos. Mention ‘sign up today to be in this week’s draw’. Use a touch 3 times campaign – radio ad, social media, leaflet drop, advert in paper saying ‘look out for canvassers’ etc. Don’t rely on just one method.

2. Write ‘if you want to contribute to postage put a stamp on the envelope’.

3. Raffles Several hospices mentioned that they don’t use freepost envelopes any more, just addressed envelopes. Severn hospice did a lavender scented Spring raffle which was successful. They had lots of nice comments amount the scented mailing. ______Chairman Vice Chairman Treasurer Directors Chris Routley Charlotte Schofield Anthony Lord, Liz Singleton, Eric Russell, Carmel Hudson, Simi Epstein, Carl Bayliss, Richard Davies Ticketless draws seem to becoming more popular. St David’s have rung round non responders and got a good response. 2 or 3 raffles per year? Douglas Macmillan used to do 3 but have gone back to 2 per year. Try a free prize draw in which supporters are offered the chance to take part and asked for a donation instead of paying for tickets.

4. New Players A telephone campaign to lapsed players between 6 months and 5 years was carried out with 500 signing up at a cost of £5,000. A company called Redwood was used and came recommended. Costs depends on quantities and type of programme, lapsed, upsell etc. Typical 16% conversion rate.

5. Teddy Bears Christine Vorres sends out fridge magnets which are flat and don’t cost any more in postage. They cost 11p each. St Giles have finished using teddy bears, their last one was called Dawina, paying tribute to one of their nurses.

______Chairman Vice Chairman Treasurer Directors Chris Routley Charlotte Schofield Anthony Lord, Liz Singleton, Eric Russell, Carmel Hudson, Simi Epstein, Carl Bayliss, Richard Davies