[Psml] FW: Barriers to Registration

[Markus Ritter]

Dear Dan

 

The word block is used because some people are too shy to use e-mail or phones to register for a public boating course or a public seminar, yet they are perfectly comfortable with an optonal, on-line form.

 

When listing a public course or seminar on the HQ-800 form one has to activly check a box to enable on-line registration to prevent blocking that feature.  

 

You can say that I am in favor of opening as many ways as practical to get through the eye of the needle.

 

Sincerely yours and thanks for all you do.

 


Markus Ritter AP

Door County

 

America's Boating Course from America's Boating Club

click where the cursor turns into a hand.


 



Date: Mon, 6 Jul 2009 11:38:14 -0400
From: dtb at usps.org
Subject: Re: [Psml] FW: Barriers to Registration
CC: psml at usps.org
To: markusritter at hotmail.com

I have been following this whole thing with a bit of confusion since this is all my software.
First of all what is the "block" option?  I don't have a clue.

The way the software works is there is a system called the 800 system which lets squadrons list their courses online.  If they want online registration for the course they check a box which says "Allow online registration".  If they don't want it they don't check it.  Also when they list a course there is a required field for course contact and a field for telephone number and a field for email address.  You have to pick a minimum of one.

Then there is a locate a class near you page which allows the public to find a course.  The easiest and preferred method is by their zip code.  They get back a list sorted by distance between their zip code and the zip code of where the class is given.  Part of the information displayed is the contact name and telephone and email depending on what they entered.  No email address provided, no email address shown.  If the class was listed with online registration and the contact had an email address listed, there is a link to the online registration form which will be emailed to the contact after the potential student fills it out.

What am I missing?  What is this blocked stuff all about?

Cheers,
Dan
At 11:33 AM 7/5/2009, Kristi W. Anderson wrote:

As much as I agree that no one should be blocked, you would be amazed at all
the road blocks national (that means every department) hits when we try to
implement something to make the squadrons better.  Some: sqd barely
surviving so no volunteer has a PC; personalities don't allow the change as
"this is the way we always did it" (ex: increasing of dues at district
level); not feasible in this area of the country (ex: how the calculations
for awards are handled); etc.  Thus everything done at national has a
contingency - the squadron gets to choose (ex: the way they handle dues).
This is great!  But, it causes a lot of extra work and in this case
development.  Point is, if National IT offers a new feature, there is always
one squadron that is surviving with folks who do not have a desire to have a
computer, have 5 people in the sqd and barely call themselves a squadron,
but love USPS.  Therefore, this is affecting everyone. As stated before,
maybe before we complain, we can offer a suggested resolution with the
problem.  In this case, add a text line "If your SEO does not have email,
and there is no one else in the squadron that is willing or able to use
theirs for this purpose, then choose the "block" option."  I do highly
recommend the forward/blind email address as mentioned before.  But this
text line would help to explain why it is done this way.  PS - some
squadrons will read this and then start using this as an excuse (not wanting
the gen public emailing them.)  Yeah, we have heard it all.  :-)  But we
keep trying to better the process and help the squadrons regardless.

Kristi Anderson
IT Committee

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_______________________________________________
P/C Dan Bartell, SN  
SEO - Shallotte River Sail & Power Squadron - D27 (NC)
Member USPS National Information Technology Committee  

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