Managing the secretariat - Membership

So, you’ve registered your society and would like to start getting members to start joining.

A good place to start, is the Constitution of your society. How many categories of members are allowed? Is the society allowed to have Life Members and Ordinary Members? Are there restrictions on who can be a member (for example, prohibitions on foreign memberships, age limits, etc?)

What are the subscription fees stated in the Constitution, for different categories of members? What are the provisions on renewal of membership?

The Constitution will usually have provisions similar to the sample below:

[SAMPLE]

3.             Membership

(1)                Membership shall be opened to Malaysian citizens, residents and permanent residents of Malaysia aged eighteen (18) years and above.

(2)                Every application for membership shall be proposed and seconded by two existing members and shall be forwarded to the Secretary who shall, at the first convenient opportunity, submit it to the Committee for approval. The Committee may, at its discretion, reject any application without assigning any reason thereof.

(3)                Every applicant  whose application has been approved as aforesaid shall, upon payment of the prescribed entrance fee and first monthly subscription, be admitted as a member of the Society and shall be entitled to all the privileges of membership.

Click on this link to view sample Constitutions provided by the ROS for registered societies with branches and without.  http://www.ros.gov.my/index.php/my/perkhidmatan

From the Secretariat’s perspective, you’ll need a system by which to keep track of new members. It’s best to create a spreadsheet or a word document to serve as a Register of Members, which you could update on a regular basis or, whenever a new member joins your society.

From an accounting perspective, proper records should be kept showing how much the member paid in RM as a subscription fee, as well as date of payment and date the amount was banked in to the society’s account.  A receipt should be issued to the member upon receipt of the subscription payment. 

Information that you would normally require would be the member’s name, IC No., contact details, subscription fee and date of annual renewal of membership, if applicable.

A Register of Members might just be a simple dataset of columns and rows, like the sample below:

Membership No	Name	NRIC No (if applicable)	Residential address	Contact details	Subscription fee (RM) paid on [date]	Renewal notice to be sent?