Does anyone feel that Fossedata and Higham are taking advantge of us by hiking up the fee to enter online?  In addition to charging more per dog, they also ad an extra "administration" fee.  Now having run an equine event for years and taken entries online our costs are considerably reduced and therefore we reflect this to our exhibitors by a LOWER fee for online entry.  Enter any of the Irish or European shows and the entry fee is exactly the same as a postal entry.

I agree, which is why I still do mostly postal entries.

Suspect the extra fee is to cover the extra work involved, apart for entering the names etc. into the catalogue they have to let the show society know what entries they are getting probable every day and from whom also accept the payment and have it transferred to the client, so a fair amount of extra work. It has to be paid for somehow and if not this way then the show society would be sent the bill and it would be spread through all entrants therefore putting up the general costs. It is a case of if you do not wish to pay for the service then do not use it, the other way everyone would have to pay use it or not.

But they already have the details on their database, as we put them on there for them.

With post they have to physically enter them, or for those who have already entered in the past on-line simply pull up the details they already have from before.

This is why so often spelling/ownership errors continue from show to show.

A lot more work processing written postal entries.

Postal entries are also called up from the data base. It is the keeping of accounts and records that would require extra staff that would have to be paid for.

They are definitely doing us as is every company and politician in this country!

Sorry do not agree, if you do not wish to pay for the service then do not use it but you can't expect people to subsidised your convenience.

If you mean the extra £2 charged for some shows once postal entries have closed then that is actually down to the societies concerned and not Fossedata or Higham.

Not started as don't use if if you don't agree with the charges.   There are instances when it is simply more convenient to, particularly with younger dogs when having an extra couple of weeks to decide who to enter is an advantage.  I said from experience it is far far cheaper to process entries online as all the information is in the database, including compiling the catalogues.  I have processed online entries for years, I can do in a day what would have taken me 3 days by post.  All the Irish and European shows I enter online at no extra cost. Remember, though still a ways off, cheques will be abolished so much more will have to  be done online.   If you have always entered by post and never ever had either mistakes made in deciphering your entry form to catalogue, had entries not arrive (a local show secretary got a mail sack full of 400 entries for as show 2 weeks after the close of entries that had been sitting at the local sorting office!), or even dogs put into the wrong class you are in the minority.  Your online entry is totally your responsibility the information and details are correct and I simply like being able to double check everything is as I want it to appear in the catalogue before hitting that payment button.  Just feel like Fossedata and Higham are taking a bit of the Michael.

> Just feel like Fossedata and Higham are taking a bit of the Michael

But its not Fossedata or Higham who implement these charges, its the clubs and societies.

The extra £1 is surely them?

Barbara, from Memory, when I was Chairman of our local Society, we went with Fossedata as a one off, we were not allowed the late entry system by the KC, as were too late to request it.. so extra charge for late entry did not apply, however, when our following show was due, we still had not found another printer, and again went with Fosse, allowing for a late entry system.. We charged the extra fee for late entries...

There was so much work involved for the secretary using Fosse, we went back to using a manual printer.. all entries came to sec, and then to printer etc.. using Fosse was a nightmare...

I also don't think the societies insist on the £1 charge?? Cd  be wrong? 

When I looked into using them for online entries for our shows, they charge an % of entry to the Society, and then their £1 or whatever on top, then the extra after closing is the Society although they will get part back int the %.

I think Show societies will have to look at reducing costs, soon in order to keep up entries.  They all keep saying they are not losing entries but everyone exclaims how low their entry is!

In my experience the whole affair is handled by them, once entries are closed, catalogues are printed and the show "put to bed" they send the balance to the Club concerned. We had very little contact until entries closed. certainly not daily. This may be different now or different for other clubs but that is how it was done with us. I have no complaints with the service but I can say we did not charge more for non postal entries and I do not know where the extra per dog stems from-club or company?

Jeff.

I have never used online entry & don't intend to start..why pay more to enter a dog than you need to, the entries are dear enough without extra cost.
I understand there is costs for admin but I wonder who does the admin for the shows that don't have online facilities...oh yes THE SECRETARY..lol

enries must be down cause the last three shows have extened there deadline by at least four days, southern counties was supposed to close on tues 27th but is still open until fri 30th, so has bath and birmingham.

> We charged the extra fee for late entries...
>

I wasn't refering to the later entry charge (which is fair enough if it is clear, that a higher fee applies) but the extra £1.

I think the extra charge is do with when you pay be card there is a 2.5% 'handling' fee through the banks, the shops etc seem to absorb this charge, perhaps thats why they do it.

im still doing postal entries and will do for as long as i can

A lot of the postal entries allow payment by card, (have done since before the on-line entry facility) and in future I suppose we will all have to pay that way as they are doing away with cheques.

> I wasn't refering to the later entry charge (which is fair enough if it is clear, that a higher fee applies) but the extra £1.

I for one don't mind the £1 fee.  I can decide if I want to pay it or not by doing a postal entry.  As someone who does online sales I know the costs involed in card transatcions online and I'm quite happy to pay £1 for the convenience.

It probably works out cheaper for me to do it online, even with the extra charge..   1st class stamp 30p(ish)  16mile round trip to post office.. possibly £1 in fuel.. minimum 40minute journey round trip... BUT..... well, nip into Tesco for bread and milk..and  bang goes another £30 :-)   online entries save me a small fortune ;-)

LOL, me I am a city girl, second class stamp (1st no guarantee to get there quicker these days), and post box across the road.

If I enter by post I send an stamped postcard for the secretary to confirm receipt.  By the time I've bought the postcard and an extra stamp, plus the postage for the actual entry, the £1 charge for entering online is a cheaper option and I get immediate confirmation that my entry has gone in...

Proof of posting is free at the post office, but I rarely bother.

tbo i don't mind paying extra £1 to enter online.  at least you know the  entry is received.  with the state of the royal mail at the moment i'm happy to use it.

BTW my friend travelled  200 odd miles to a club show recently and found her entries hadn't been received luckily she'd got proof of postage on her.

enries must be down cause the last three shows have extened there deadline by at least four days, southern counties was supposed to close on tues 27th but is still open until fri 30th, so has bath and birmingham.

It may be that some deadlines have been extended because of the travel problems people have experienced recently due to the volcanic ash cloud. Lots of people have not been able to get back to UK on their expected dates of return and lots of deadlines in all walks of life have now been extended to allow for this.