January 2020 Newsletter

Welcome to 2020!

Here’s wishing you and your families a very Happy New Year. May it be a blessed one for all of us!

I know many of you are still on vacation (as am I), but there are a few quickies I need to convey to all of you, before the rat race gets back in earnest next week.

Please take note of a very important action/request below application to ALL LSC members, regarding re-validating your access key tag (fob) numbers.

1. SQUASH COURT MAINTENANCE COMPLETED:

The repair work to the front wall of Squash Court 2 was completed in December. Feedback from members who have subsequently played on the court is very encouraging. We haven’t heard any of the “gun shot” sounds that were very common with the delaminating fibre-glass.

A big thank you to Clive Moses for re-painting both our squash courts in December. They are both looking great!

2. LOAD-SHEDDING:

As was predicted in December, the festive season hiatus of loadshedding was short-lived, and it appears that regular black-outs will become the new norm in South Africa this year.

Our Committee is therefore seriously looking into a back-up solution that will keep the lights of our two squash courts on during outages.

If you are a guru in this field, please can you contact Jerry Nicholas at jerry@go-bet.co.za.

I’ve tasked him to research the best options, and present them at our next Committee Meeting on 22 January

3. SUBS PAYMENTS:

Subs for the 2019/20 season were due in September 2019.

In my previous Newsletter sent out in early December, I gave 15 December as the deadline for any outstanding Subs to be settled, or keytags and online booking system access would be deactivated.

That resulted in quite a few EFT POPs hitting Sheena’s InBox, so thank you.

With Sheena, Jerry and I being on leave these past few weeks, the tag and access deactivations will kick-off next week. So if you’re still on our “naughty list” for unpaid Subs, you’ve got one last lifeline to pay this weekend and send your EFT POP to Sheena (sheenastephens@iafrica.com), and cc me.

If you’re unsure whether you’ve paid or not, then please email Sheena and she will confirm for you.

If you are unpaid and do get deactivated, you will need to pay a R100 reactivation levy, in addition to your Subs.

4. KEY TAG (FOB) VALIDATIONS:

We will be doing another round of key tag/fob validations in January. We last did this 3 years ago, so it is long overdue.

We’ve got over 650 tags registered on our access control system (150 of which are assigned to HBTC for allocation to their Social Members). We currently have around 230 active LSC members, so that means that there is a large number of key tags that are (or at least, should be) no longer is use.

This is understandable, as members often lose their tags and need to purchase a replacement. And members who resign don’t always return their tags, so we simply deactivate those tags.

But having not done a validation for a few years, we are concerned that there are likely to be quite a few active tags unaccounted for, and the risk is that these have found there way into the hands of non-members.

So, to negate this risk, I need to task each of you with a simple action that will take you no more than 15 seconds:-

Please locate your fob, check the 3-digit number that has been scratched into the one side, and reply to this mail with that 3-digit code. Simple.

Please don’t WhatsApp me, as I don’t have all your cell numbers saved on my phone, and it will also be a lot more cumbersome for me to manage the admin.

The deadline for you to do this 15-second action is 31 January.  (Don’t worry, I will send you another reminder of two before then).

NB: Remember, some of you who are Family Members have more than one keytag issued to your household, but you may be the only member receiving this email.

So make sure you send me the 3-digit codes for ALL tags issued to your family.

We will be deactivating all keytags that have not been validated by 31 January during the first week of February.

So if you choose to ignore this request, you’re going to find yourself standing outside a locked gate with a deactivated tag in February, cursing yourself for procrastinating/forgetting.

And don’t expect Jerry to drop everything and reactivate it for you. (He will endeavour to work to a 7-day commitment to get your tag reactivated).

5. SUMMER LEAGUE SOCIAL SQUASH:

Our very popular annual Summer League Social Squash tournament will kick-off during the week of 20 January.

Look out for a separate email that will hit your InBoxes after this one, providing more details and inviting entries.

That’s it for this edition. Thanks for reading to the end.

For those still on vacation, enjoy your last few days of relaxation.

And don’t forget to send me your key tag number(s). Carpe Diem!

Cheers

Rob