What's the use of RYA membership? NONE!

[Guest]

What\'s the use of RYA membership? NONE!

Okay, I confess, this week I joined the RYA to get my sail numbers. It cost me £28 (I think) and the sail numbers were then "free". Else I could have paid £18 and had the sail numbers. So, I figured the membership for a tenner was worth a try.

WHAT A WASTE OF MONEY!

I don't want some silly credit card, or for the RYA to offer me ISP access. I don't want anything they offer. It's crap.

They sent me their magazine (the issue from Summer 2001 and the "current" one. GAWD, it's enough to make you give up sailing. Boring, predictable, naturally very politically correct, and totally unchallenging. A useless rag which advanced my knowledge of boating by not one iota. Read (what there was other than self serving back patting and advertisments) and binned.

So they have committees. YAWN. So Princess Anne is the patron. Why? etc.

I had expected their website to have all manner of information. Well, even with the correct login, they seem to have lots of pretty pages, with lots of headlines BUT NO INFORMATION.

As a matter of fact, their website must surely rank as being as useful as the proverbial Naval Officer on a yacht. Silly ranting? Go take a look - click on "RACING" then on "RULES" and see what you get? Try some other examples - almost all as empty. The FAQ is basic and is infinitely better covered in PBO and YM.

I really feel like I've been ripped off. Why the hell do they need 90, yes NINETY, employees? What the hell do they do? Could they not do as much with 45 - dozens could be shed just by not offering silly services which are almost totally unrelated to boating in any form.

Perhaps I will wait until next week and then cancel my membership just to prove my disgust with them.

 

[castaway]

Re: What\'s the use of RYA membership? NONE!

Blimey.....

 

[Guest]

(my doctor said ...

DON'T HOLD IT IN <G>

 

[Guest]

Ha Ha H

Cancel your membership next week??? But you've already paid?????? Purrrrhaps Steve Cronin and all points East of Suez can sort you out!

Being an ex-member of the RYA I would like to say that I would like to be a member of CA but can't afford their excessive annual fees ....

At the end of the day, what I do is sail (sometimes across the pond ... but sowhat) ... and I still can't work out just how to work out the possible apparent wind(s) so that I can point point point accrording to the [censored]ing BBC's s[censored]ing forecasts at 0535 and 0135 ....

 

[Guest]

They can stick it up their stern glands!*

*

 

[Guest]

Re: (my doctor said ...

Now where have I heard that statement before?

EEEEEeeee

 

[LadyInBed]

Re: What\'s the use of RYA membership? NONE!

Hey Hump your really on a role (or do I mean rant?) I didn’t take you for a Hump by name Hump by nature, when we met at Poole RNLI.
But to your present rant, the RYA is no different from any other of these orgust body’s. They start up with a good cause, grow, get recognised as the official body, grow more, then the political animals get attracted, grow more still, so they have permanent staff and overheads so have to become commercial, which attracts the career animal. The idealists have got disenchanted and long since left.
And what you are left with is what you have just joined!
It happened to the British Sub-Aqua Club many years back, so I left them. Saw it with the RYA so never joined.

 

[claymore]

Re: What\'s the use of RYA membership? NONE!

They've done a lot of good in representing the views of the boating fraternity. They have an excellent coaching and sail training structure which is the envy of many other Nations and their legal department is first class. Perhaps cruising people - like windsurfers are unclubbable - perhaps you don't feel you need them - its a free world. I am a member and having served on a couple of committees and worked for them I think they do a good job. Just the other side of the coin.

 

[paulrossall]

Re:They do a good job

I can get very upset about some of these bodies and indeed I have not renewed my RNLI membership as I am disguisted about the Thames and lifeguards on beaches etc. However the RYA do a good job re training and rules and regs even though some of their activities do not apply to me.

 

[poter]

Re: What\'s the use of RYA membership? NONE!

Hang on a minute......
The B.S.A.C. and the RYA are only as good as the members who support it....
get involved !
If you think its crap then do something...........

Bye....

Poter

 

[Guest]

Re: What\'s the use of RYA membership? NONE!

can understand where you are coming from on some of it.
But ask yourself- who else fights the European Legislation that Brussels is trying to implement on us. - you would change you tune if you got done for drink sailing with 2 glasses of wine in your blood instead of one. etc....
Also look what the RYA and the lottery comission have done in now placing us as a nation at the top of sailing- Olympics???
Having worked in the sailing industry for a number of years, I feel they are of immense benefit to the industry.

 

[jamesjermain]

Re: What\'s the use of RYA membership? NONE!

Dear Humperdink,

Rants against the RYA seam to come around in roughly 18-month cycles so this is a bit soon after the last. I posted at lenght a few months ago as the freelance consultant editor to the 'useless' journal you so admire. I am not on the staff and I am not an official spokesman, but do please read my original post if you did not do so at the time.

When we meet in June I will talk you through, at length, all the things the RYA spends your 75p (about) a week on and the role of the 90-odd staff.

I might also bop you on the nose.

All the best

James

JJ

 

[Guest]

Re:They do a good job

The training is good etc., but why 90 people? What does a MEMBER actually get for the membership?

 

[Guest]

Hmmm

I was disappointed by the magazine because it was so dreadfully politically correct, and it rather lacked content. Maybe that's the role of the Yottipress?

What struck me most was the sheer lack of resource actually available to a member of the RYA. What it boiled down to seems to be sail numbers (relatively easy) and a legal help line. What was stunning was the almost total lack of content on the web site (with the notable exception of the FAQ section which is great, but (alas) brief.

This is not to say the RYA does not perform an essential role in promoting the interests of boaters because they most certainly do. If one was to leave it up to the MCA I doubt we would be allowed to have boats - well, slight exageration but they don't seem very pro-boating.

I don't really count the training as a member benefit as you have to pay for the training and pay for the examination - and you don't have to be a member to receive either. I assume (possibly incorrectly) that the training is therefore self funding / not paid for by member's dues?

So my rant was to provoke someone who is a long term memeber to tell me what I have overlooked .... what are the hidden benefits? So far I am still in the dark.

I applaud the legal stance taken against certain organisations charging for moorings when they should not, and for causing the Greeks to change the name of their foreigner tax.

BTW, I think the training program is outstanding in amost every respect (why the accuracy of plotting a position on dry land is required strikes me as unreaslistic).

Rather than bopping me on the nose, let me buy you a beer instead. More civilised ...

 

[ParaHandy]

Re: What\'s the use of RYA membership? NONE!

You might have read the interview with CEO of MCA in PBO/YM recently? He’d done his homework when he compared boat users with RYA membership. He didn’t quite say that RYA were irrelevant (because so few boat users were members) but that was what he implied. You could ask the new RYA chairman’s opinion when you interview him “for the spring issue”?

 

[Guest]

Re: What\'s the use of RYA membership? NONE!

I am a member and dont begrudge them a penny! I have zero interest in Racing, so much of the Mag does not appeal to me either. BUT in some governmental dept right now, probably Brussels, a civil servant is thinking of what we boaters need next to protect us against ourselves. A nautical qualification would be their first choice, something that can be administerd, revised, disciplined by civil servants, second choice, similar for the boat, and of course the admin fess would have to be funded from the Exams.
Safeguarding our interests from this very real threat, is the RYA, and I think they do a good job. They have already taken the Greek Governmaent to task for charging illegal boat fees. Try telling your MP to represent you in such matters and see how much response you get. If the RYA make one mistake, it is that they do not make enough capital with boaters about the issues they save us from. You have only got to look at Marina Fees in the UK to imagine what would happen if there was no RYA baulk against compulsary regulations.
I would hope that you would support their efforts in this respect alone, ignoring what they do for good cause such as disabled Sailing. Please, just send your fee, and dont read the magazine,
Regards spits

 

[jamesjermain]

Re: What\'s the use of RYA membership? NONE!

He said that in his RYA MAgazine interview as well.

I asked that question of George Clark and his answer is in the Spring issue which will, of course, be essential reading for all cruising yachtsmen. If you aren't a member join now or find a copy in your local club bar.

JJ

 

[jamesjermain]

I\'ll have a Murphys in Crosshaven. nm

,

JJ

 

[mtb]

Re: now then raggy dont lose your rag

It is freedom of choice ,you have the option not to carry on your membership or to try to do something positive about it.
I would voice my opinion to the actual people concerned to get some feedback and perhaps take an active role in improving the areas your not happy about .
Mick

http://homepage.ntlworld.com/boats
I want a big steel ex trawler / tug v/cheep or swap for tug

 

[LadyInBed]

Re: do something . . I did - I left nm