Annual General Meeting – Wednesday 15 January 11:30am
Dear Member
This email covers the following important issues:
- Date and location of AGM
- ICS Trip and Event Feedback Summary
- Financial Report 2024
- ICS Membership subscription fee 2025
- Committee Appointments
- Minutes of the last AGM on Wednesday 21 January 2024
- How to cast your votes on issues proposed. Online, In person or by proxy
- Facebook Live
- Membership Renewals 2025
Please do take your time to read through the details. You will see sections marked for INFORMATION or ACTION
We would like to share with you our plans for our Annual General Meeting (AGM).
Our Annual General Meeting is an important event in our calendar. An opportunity to reflect on the past year and then to look forward to opportunities in the year ahead. It is also the time to review the housekeeping and administration of the ICS including our financial position and committee.
1. INFORMATION – Date and Location of AGM
We propose to host the AGM at La Brasa Hotel & Restaurant, Velez De Benaudalla on Wednesday 15 January at 11:30am in the Comedor/Restaurant. It would be helpful if you could arrive by 11am to allow time to register your attendance. The Meeting will be called to order at 11:30am. We will provide refreshments after the meeting of coffee and biscuits, of course you can buy a coffee before we get started then please feel free to see our hostess, Africa or one of her team on arrival.
2. INFORMATION – ICS Trip & Event Feedback Summary Form
Again, this year we can provide you with a Summary of the feedback received throughout the past year. This document shows you the scores given in our feedback questionnaires following our trips and events. We have used the scores, and any comments received to help inform us of opportunities to change what or how we do things going forward.It is great to see that in almost every category and for every trip or event the scores are almost the maximum possible. No action is required for this report, it is for information only.
CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD A COPY OF THE FEEDBACK SUMMARY FORM
3. ACTION – Financial Report 2024
CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD OUR FINANCIAL REPORT 2024
CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD EXPENDITURE GRAPH 2024
It is very important to us that we share as much information with you as possible. Particularly regarding the ways in which your annual subscriptions are used and more generally the ways in which monies received by the club are handled. We have introduced a new look to our Financial report this year to give as much information and as clearly as possible. This document gives you a summary of receipts and expenditure in 2024. Firstly how our petty cash was used throughout the year. As you know we try to keep our cash handling to a minimum for a number of reasons to benefit you, our members as well as our committee and the club generally. Next we have information regarding our Bank account with Banco Sabadell which is used for the majority of our transactions, for transparency and security in particular. You can see that we ended the year with a healthy credit balance of 2,256.97 euros.
Next we have details of our STRIPE online payments service account which we use to receive the majority of payments from you during the year.
Below STRIPE you can see our Sumup Payment Service Account which we use occasionally for payments in person by card or cash. We are moving away from Sumup this coming year as we have a more competitive service from our bankers, Banco Sabadell as part of a move to a bank account package better suiting our needs and offering lower fees going forward.
On the right hand side of the report you can see the Trips and Events Summary where we itemise each event held during the year and the particular costings for each. As we have discussed often previously, some events produce a surplus balance and others negative. The surplus from events can be used to fund those with negative balance, often to “add value” or ensure a trip or event can go ahead as planned. Generally, the more trips and events you engage in as a member, the more you contribute and the more you benefit generally. This formula has proved very successful for many years now.
Last year we introduced an appeal for fund raising for our ukulele group who were in desperate need of sound equipment to facilitate performances in large or outdoor venues. We received a fantastic response and over 1,500 euros was raised towards the total cost of 2,050 euros. You will see that there is a shortfall of €487.30. This has been covered by the International Club from funds available. We applied for a grant from the Mancomunidades de Costa Tropical, a government body that considers, agrees and makes contributions to projects in the Costa Tropical area. They formally agreed a contribution towards our fund raising to buy equipment but when we acted on the purchase and submitted the receipts we were told that it had been agreed in error and we did not qualify! This was more than disappointing and subsequently we have discovered, is not uncommon! We will talk a little more about this in the AGM itself!
Next you have details of the funds raised at various activities during the year for the Red Cross. We have a payment to make to them of 104 euros.
Asset Purchases have been included to give you line of sight of the equipment that we have purchased during the year. Much of this is the sound equipment for the ukulele group. As promised when we opened the fundraising, the equipment would be the property of the International Club and it is itemised in our records as assets. It is a great benefit to have the right equipment for our activities, when required. It is also testament to prudent financial governance that we have assets and a healthy bank balance.
Finally we itemise Professional services. Of course, we have our Public Liability insurance policy and also the costs relating to our biannual committee registration undertaken by our gestor, Alberto Martin of Actio Asesores, Motril.
Action is required for this report. Members are asked to confirm that they are satisfied with it’s content and that it may be included in our records for 2024. Our financial statement is not required to be submitted to the Agencia Tributaria but could be called upon if needed by the authorities.
Expenditure Graph 2024 shows that we continue to see a healthy margin of excess income every year. It supports the argument that an increase in subscriptions is still not required. Of course this will be monitored and reconsidered in the future as necessary.
QUERIES : If you do have any queries regarding the statement you can raise them in your online voting response or drop us an email. It would be helpful to raise them in advance of the meeting so that we can prepare the fullest response possible.
4. INFORMATION – Membership Subscription Fee 2025
At our AGM in 2024 we discussed our Annual Membership Fee, currently 15 Euros each per year, payable on joining and January annually. Generally, we manage well with the funds available each year but there has been no increase in subscriptions since 2019 and it was felt last year that an increase could be considered in 2025. However, what is clear from our financial statements is that thanks to a growing membership we continue to maintain healthy balance with our Bank and easily cover the costs associated with our administration of the club. If we were to increase our annual subscription, say by 5 euros that would yield approximately 1,500 euros and generally push our balance up to 3,500 euros, without any real increase in our costs. Consequently, the committee has reached the conclusion that our membership subscription should in fact remain at 15 euros per annum for the coming year.
5. ACTION – Committee Appointments – Vacancy to fill
An important part of our AGM is the appointment of members to Committee roles. You may recall that at our AGM two years ago we agreed to appoint committee members for two year terms rather than one year. This is important as it saves the costs of registering our committee members so often with the authorities – The Junta De Andalucia and the Agencia Tributaria. This registration is necessary as it provides them with a clear line of sight of those acting on behalf of the club at any moment in time.
We do have one vacancy for Vocale on the committee. If you would like to be considered for the vacancy, or would like to nominate someone else, then please do let us know. As Vocale, there are no direct responsibilities, rather, contributing to the administration, decision making and delivery during the next 12 months, in this instance, as a secondment without registration by the Junta de Andalucia as the next planned registration of committee members in in 2026.
6. ACTION – Minutes of the last Annual General Meeting on Wednesday 21 January 2024.
As is always the case, the minutes of our last meeting are included so that members can confirm that they are satisfied with the content and that they may be included in our records for 2024.
The master copy of our minutes are recorded and numbered sequentially in accordance with the requirements of the Junta De Andalucia for Clubs and Associated bodies, as advised by our Gestor, Alberto Martin of Actio Asesores, Motril.
CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD MINUTES FROM AGM 2024
7. ACTION – Voting – Online, In Person or by Proxy
Again, we have voting online on a few important issues. It worked well last year and enabled so many of our members to vote and share their views easily and conveniently, even if they were not able to attend in person.
At the bottom of this email is a link to our AGM voting. You will be taken to an online page that requires your email address registered with the International Club and you will be able to vote on the issues raised. Each question (vote) must be responded to before you can submit your votes. You will only be able to respond once with your votes. Duplicate voting is not allowed but members who share an email address with their partner can also vote. Ensure you complete the full name required. A check will be made once all votes are recorded and voting closed to ensure that the email address matches our records. If you vote against any proposal, it would be helpful if you could provide comments in the final box to help us to understand your objection better.
Of course, you are not obliged to vote online, you can do so in person at the meeting, or you can nominate someone who is attending to vote on your behalf by completing our Voting Proxy form. A copy of the form is attached should you prefer to use that. Please complete the form fully and return it to us before the meeting starts at 11am on 15 January. Signed electronic copies are also accepted.
CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD PROXY FORM FOR PRINT
8. INFORMATION – Facebook Live – Tune in to watch if you can’t make the meeting
We know that it is often the case that members cannot be at the meeting in person, so, we intend to show a Facebook Live stream of the event which will be saved and an edited version made available shortly after the meeting. You can also pick up the live stream from our website on our ICS Live Stream page so you don’t even have to have a Facebook account to watch!
9. INFORMATION – Membership Renewal 2025 – Quick, Easy and Secure!
Again, shortly after the AGM ends we will send out an invitation to all members to renew their membership for 2025.
For the first time, this year some of our members will enjoy the benefits of fully automatic annual renewal! You may recall that we introduced an annual subscription which will automatically collect the agreed annual membership fee on 1 February 2025.
Should you have changed your mind and would prefer not to renew in 2025 you are able to cancel your subscription by letting us know so that we can cancel the subscription on your behalf.
For anyone without annual subscription it is still a simple and fairly automated process. You will be provided with your personal data we hold for you, and you have the option to amend anything that appears to be incorrect. If everything is fine you will then automatically go on to the screen to make payment of your membership fee quickly, conveniently and securely using our online payments system. there is no need to form a queue at the desk when we return to normal club meetings on Wednesday 22 January!
You can of course choose annual subscription when you make your renewal this year if you so choose.
Remember that it is helpful to us if we can complete membership renewal as quickly as possible so that we can get on with preparing the fun activities we have lined up for the year!
10.ACTION – Finally, it would be helpful for catering purposes if you could let us know if you (and maybe, partner) are attending the AGM. We would remind you that on arrival members will be required to sign in to record their attendance and any proxy vote nominations.
We do hope that you can make the meeting and look forward to seeing you on the day, but if you do have any queries at all please do let us know.
Thanks.
Your ICS Committee 2024-2026
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