As a sanctioned event you can benefit from the online registration system (via footbag.org) if you choose to use it. Players are able to pay with their credit card and select the events they want to participate in. They are also able to see who else has registered. As the event organizer, you are assigned access so you can monitor registration leading up to your event and are able to gauge your expected number of entrants. A deadline is set for pre-registration to be available. Usually 24 hours before the event. Once the deadline has passed you are able to retrieve and print the final info. Online registration will process new IFPA members automatically, but you are responsible for enforcing it at on-site registration. So, you will only need to sign up new IFPA members for on-site/late entrants who are not already IFPA members. Steve Goldberg will set up the online registration and needs a minimum 2 weeks to do so. Below are instructions for how to set up and use the service.
Instructions to event organizer:
After you have received sanctioning approval for your event from the IFPA, you are then entitled to online registration services from footbag.org as part of your event listing (on the footbag.org website).
If you wish to use this service, please follow these instructions carefully. If you do not wish to use online registration via footbag.org, then you can stop here and you do not need to fill out this form.
After you have received sanctioning approval, if you desire online registration, you should immediately fill this form out entirely and e-mail it along with any other instructions to Steve Goldberg <brat @ footbag.org>. The sooner you send it to Steve (after receiving sanctioning approval), the better. PLEASE allow Steve 2 weeks to set up your online registration form.
Also, in your e-mail to Steve (with your request using the form below), PLEASE delete *everything* in the form below except the ANSWER lines as you add your responses, so that he can find the information quickly. (He knows what each number stands for, so he just needs the ANSWER lines with the numbers and your answers.)
1. QUESTION: What is the exact URL (web-page address) of your tournament listing on footbag.org, including the numeric event ID? If you don't already have a footbag.org tournament listing, you *must* create one before you continue filling out this questionnaire. (You simply go to http://www.footbag.org/events/new to add an event to the upcoming events list on footbag.org. Once you have done that, you can view the event in the events list and the address will look something like http://www.footbag.org/events/show/EVENTID (where EVENTID is a numeric value, which is your event's ID). Copy the URL (web page address) from the listing page and paste it in the answer for 1. below: 1. ANSWER: http://www.footbag.org/events/show/__________ -- 2. QUESTION: What is the deadline for *online* registration (exact date and time in local time zone)? Examples: (U.S. method:) May 10, 2006, 12:59pm PDT or (European method:) 9. June 2006, 23.59 (Paris) We recommend having online registration end 24 hours before your on-site registration (e.g., if you have a registration party on Friday night, you should make online registration deadline be midnight on Thursday night/Friday morning). If you have a very big event (such as European or World Championships), and need to have people register well in advance so you can plan things like t-shirt orders, etc., you should set this to midnight before the last date you need numbers to place orders and make sure everyone knows they must pre-register. In this case, we recommend charging a "late fee" for people who register on-site after this deadline so that you get the best results to help you plan your event. Use whichever notation for date/time you're most comfortable with in the answer below as with the examples above: 2. ANSWER: -- 3. QUESTION: In what monetary currency do you want the registration form to display the amounts whenever referring to money? In other words, wherever there are prices listed on your online entry form, what monetary units should they be in terms of? Give *both* the spelled-out name of the currency IN ENGLISH, *and* an example of how you write a monetary amount using the symbol. Examples (please use 10 as the amount, when you give your example): Canadian Dollars / CAD $10 Czech Crowns / Kc 10 US Dollars / US $10 Euro Dollars / EU10 etc. 3. ANSWER: [remember to give both English name and abbreviation as above] -- 4. QUESTION: Do you wish to allow mail-in payments to guarantee pre-registration for your tournament if sent before registration deadline? (Not all tournaments will want this option -- you should only say "yes" if you intend to check your mail regularly for mail-in payments, and if you are able to handle various forms of payment, from checks to international money orders, and if you are certain you have a good system in place for recording receipt of payments by mail so that, when the player arrives at your tournament, you know they've already paid!) 4. ANSWER: [yes/no] -- If you said "no" to 4. then please skip to question 5. 4a. QUESTION: (only if you said "yes" to 4. above) Please give exact instructions for mail-in payments -- exactly what address to mail to, whom to make checks payable to, whether you accept checks or international money orders, etc. This will vary depending on whether you are expecting international players or just local players. So please be sure to tailor your instructions to your expected audience of registrants. For example, if you're in the U.S. and running a local tournament within the U.S., then you can say, "Make checks in payable to" and give your name (or the name on your club's bank account) and then your full mailing address. If you're in Europe and expect to have players coming from the U.S., you may want to say, "Mail-in payments are only accepted for European players who are pre-paying with Eurocheques. If you are coming from the U.S., please use the credit card option." (Just as an example.) Please just be very clear, and REMEMBER to include your full mailing address (including the country, if applicable) because these directions will be included directly in the registration form. Note: the concept of mail-in payments is that players can "guarantee" their registrations (and possibly avoid late-fees and early check-in times) by pre-paying. If you don't offer credit card or if players don't have credit cards, this might be a nice option. And so you need to explain exactly how they should go about sending in a payment if they want to guarantee their registration here. Else, players may pre-register but never pay 'til they check in at the tournament site, which may mean you can't be sure exactly who is competing until everyone has arrived and checked in. 4a. ANSWER: [please type the *exact* text of what you want displayed as instructions on the entry form for mail-in payments] -- 5. QUESTION: Do you wish to accept instant Credit Card (Visa/MasterCard) payments? 5. ANSWER: [yes/no] -- If you answered "no" in 5. above, please skip to question 6. 5a. QUESTION: If you are not in the U.S., and if you are allowing online credit card payments (which will be collected in U.S. Dollars!), then you will need to pick a *permanent* exchange rate for online registration. The reason it's permanent is that we will not adjust the rate every day -- we will keep the same rate throughout the entire period of online registration for simplicity's sake. If you are not offering online payment via credit card (below), then you can ignore this (leave it blank unless you plan to use our credit card payment system -- read below). Please type the exchange rate exactly as in the sample equations below: Examples: (* these are only to show the idea, not real exchange rates!) 1 CAD = .71 USD 1 Kc = 0.04 USD 1 EU = 1.18 USD If you are in the U.S., and/or your tournament's currency (above) is US Dollars, then just leave 5a. blank. 5a. ANSWER: [only in terms as above! E.g., 1 of your currency = x USD] -- 6. QUESTION: What should the "Entry Fee(s)" be for your tournament? Remember that all Open competitors (men and women) must be IFPA members to compete in an IFPA-sanctioned tournament. We usually treat that as a separate line item (not bundled together with the entry fee). So, please tell us what you'd like your entry fee to be *excluding* any extra fees for IFPA membership. Most tournaments offer a different baseline fee for each division (i.e., a competitor chooses their division, and pays a fee based on their division, e.g., Open vs. Intermediate vs. Novice). Also, some tournaments charge a higher fee for "professional" competitors (those who want to be eligible to win prize money) as opposed to "amateurs" who are not interested in (nor eligible for) prize money. Here are some examples, but you are free to decide how you want to structure it: Example 1: Open Professional - Kc 2500 (all open players may win prize money) Intermediate Amateur - Kc 1000 Example 2: Open/Women's Professional - $50 Open/Women's Amateur - $30 Intermediate Amateur - $20 Novice Amateur - $0 (free) Note in Examples 1 & 2, all "open" players will be required to join IFPA. A separate entry will exist on all registration forms that offer open events to allow people to register for IFPA online. There are several constraints to the way the online registration system works, so you can't have too complicated of a pricing scheme. Most tournaments work well with either a "flat rate" fee (one fee for the entire event, based on division, as above) or with a very simple rate structure (for example, with a small baseline entry fee, plus a fixed amount for each event). You can charge a price for each event in 7. below -- the answer to *this* question (for the "entry fee(s)") is only the fixed portion. Please summarize your primary tournament entry fee(s) here, excluding any per-event fees or IFPA membership dues: 6. ANSWER: -- 7. QUESTION: What events will you offer? You must pick from the list below. If you have an extra events, save them for question 8. below. For any prize money event, please put a $ in the [ ], else put an x. For example, [$] means "prize money event, where [x] means "event offered, but no prize money", and [ ] means "event not offered". Any event that has special restrictions will be covered in question 8. Also, in the ___ in front of each event, if there's a per-event fee to be charged if a player registers for that event, please include the fee. For example, if your currency is Kc and you want to charge 30Kc extra for each event, then you may say [$] 30 Open Singles Freestyle and [x] 30 Int. Singles Freestyle (just an example). If you don't charge per-event fees, then just leave off any numeric values and we'll know there's no fee other than the entry fees as described above. 7. ANSWER: [ ] ___ Open Singles Net [ ] ___ Open Singles Freestyle [ ] ___ Open Doubles Net [ ] ___ Open Doubles Freestyle [ ] ___ Open Shred:30 [ ] ___ Open Sick 3-Trick [ ] ___ Open Sick Trick [ ] ___ Women's Singles Net [ ] ___ Women's Singles Freestyle [ ] ___ Women's Doubles Net [ ] ___ Women's Doubles Freestyle [ ] ___ Women's Shred:30 [ ] ___ Women's Sick 3-Trick [ ] ___ Women's Sick Trick [ ] ___ Open Mixed Doubles Net [ ] ___ Open Mixed Doubles Freestyle [ ] ___ Int. Singles Net [ ] ___ Int. Singles Freestyle [ ] ___ Int. Doubles Net [ ] ___ Int. Doubles Freestyle [ ] ___ Int. Shred:30 [ ] ___ Int. Sick 3-Trick [ ] ___ Int. Sick Trick -- 8. QUESTION: List any other events you want to offer (be very explicit, and try as much as you can to follow the official rules of footbag sports in the name, division, and format of any events you offer that are not in the list above). As with the list above, please put [$] if prize-money is offered, or [x] if not, and put the entry fee in place of ___ if there's a per-event fee to register for the event. 8. ANSWER: [ ] ___ Event Title - any event details (and/or special instructions) [ ] ___ Event Title - ... -- 9. QUESTION: Are there any other options/extras that players can choose from or that you want to know? For example, many tournaments offer a T-shirt (either extra, or included in the price of registration). So, here's where you'd explain how that works (i.e., what T-shirt sizes are available, and allow the player to reserve their size in advance, and/or to pay in advance if it's separate from the baseline registration, etc.). This is also the place you can put in questions of a polling nature -- i.e., if you want to know how many people are planning to stay in the host hotel, or the youth hostel, or who needs rides from the airport, etc. You can ask limited questions here and see the results after the close of online registration. In the answer below, please list each question, fee, and possible options that you want to include on the registration form, according to these examples: Question: Would you like to reserve a room at the youth hostel? Answers: yes, $15 no, $0 not sure, $0 Question: What size T-shirt would you like? Options: small, medium, large, extra large Question: Do you want an extra T-shirt? If so, it's $15. Options: small, medium, large, extra large 9. ANSWER: -- 10. QUESTION: Would you like to use IFPA's online payment service to allow users who pre-register to pay immediately using a major credit card? This service is offered by World Footbag Association (an outside contract agency) at a fee which they bill you directly of 5% of the total cost of all transactions. It is up to you to coordinate with WFA directly (via wfa@worldfootbag.com) to work out exact dates and terms of payment. IFPA does not handle registration fee payments directly in any way. If you choose to use this system, you agree to pay the 5% commission to WFA (they will deduct it directly from your credit card transactions to cover their costs). If you are outside the U.S., you will need to make special arrangements with WFA or IFPA for transfer of funds. Otherwise, if you're within the U.S., please include the name and address of the payee to which WFA should mail your check(s) once they have collected funds for your tournament via the online system. 10. ANSWER: [yes/no; then include your name/mailing address for checks if you are within the U.S. and wish to have WFA collect credit card payments on your behalf]