Hello from your new Membership Secretary!
For those of you who are new to the club (and even those who have been around for a while!), I thought I would let you know some interesting facts about our current membership.
Where do our members come from?
Although we are called Langford Tennis Club, our members come from a wide catchment area (see map). At least 25% of our members are from Langford, but we have members from as far as Stevenage, Houghton Conquest, Tempsford, Flitwick and Silsoe.
How many members do we have?
As of May 17th 2024, we had 147 playing members, 10 booking parents and 1 coach. The distribution of the different Membership categories and the age ranges are shown below.
What is the age range of our members?
Juniors are members up to and including age 18. Students are 18+ and in full time education. Seniors are members over 65. Although family membership is not depicted separately on the chart, there are 38 members who fall under this category. Family membership covers 2 adults and up to 4 juniors/students.
Adults make up the majority of our membership although through our coaching partners, ACE, we are attracting new younger players. Our oldest members are in their 80s and still going strong!
ClubSpark
The ClubSpark platform has greatly simplified Membership management. All members must now use ClubSpark for renewing their annual subscriptions. This includes those members who joined the club before the advent of ClubSpark. The ClubSpark platform links membership with payments and also allows access to the ClubSpark Booker app for booking courts. If you are not registered as an “active” member in ClubSpark you will not be able to book courts.
It is now mandatory to login to ClubSpark via an LTA login. Members who previously had a ClubSpark login and an LTA account had to merge their accounts to create a single sign-on which simplifies the process and reduces confusion caused by having multiple logins. You can get a help sheet for single sign-on from membership@langfordtennis.org.uk or if you are still having problems, please contact the helpdesk below:
https://helpcentre.lta.org.uk/help/s/contact-us
We now have a rolling annual membership which means players can join at any time of the year and their subscription lasts for a year from the time they sign up. Members can pay for their subscriptions online, although some people prefer to pay by bank transfer directly into the club account. We no longer have anyone paying by cheque! To be clear, even if you make your payment via direct bank transfer, you still need to login to ClubSpark to renew your membership.
Payment via ClubSpark utilises an online system called Stripe which takes 2.9% plus 20p for every transaction meaning that an adult subscription of £100 only pays £96.85 into our club account.
Frequently asked questions?
Since becoming Membership Secretary in late February, the most frequent questions I have been asked are probably: How do I login to ClubSpark? And how can I get a swipe card?
Swipe cards for access to the courts and keys for the clubhouse (if required) can both be obtained by contacting me on the above email address.
Finally, if anyone has any queries about any aspect of Membership, please don’t hesitate to contact me via membership@langfordtennis.org.uk
Vicky Chung