LANGHAM COMMUNITY COUNCIL
Minutes of a Finance Sub-Committee Meeting
held on 30th January 2017 at 7.30pm.

Present Alan Cadman, Liz Winter, Elizabeth Schofield, Sue Armstrong

Terms of reference
After the terms were ratified at the Trustee Meeting on 19th January, it became apparent that Andrew Craig would be unable to attend meetings on Monday evenings which was the only time available. However, the committee agreed that he should remain a member on an ad hoc basis, since his financial skills are greatly valued, particularly in the absence of an elected treasurer.

Pre-School
Following discussion at the Trustee meeting of a request from the Pre-School for financial help from the LCC and our meeting with the Pre-School management team earlier today, it was agreed that the Secretary should send out our recommendation by urgent e-mail to all Trustees, asking them to reply by Friday. In this way, we could inform the Pre-School of the LCC’s decision prior to their meeting with parents on 6th February.

Budget for 2017-18
Sue had circulated a copy of the budget spreadsheet which was last considered in March 2016. The Committee went through the maintenance plan item by item for 2015/16 and 2016/17 and discovered that most of the work had been undertaken with the majority covered in last August’s refurb programme. There were purchases necessary, such as tumblers and mugs for the kitchen, more chairs for the hall, boxes to store glasses behind the bar. The toilet roll dispensers in the ladies did not work with the present quality of paper and may need changing. Other toilet problems were mentioned, such as lack of toilet rolls and blockages of urinals.
Two new stage lights are required, the bottom of the hall walls need more frequent redecoration, the Committee room carpet is growing tired and marks have appeared on the main hall floor close to the walls. No-one is yet sure how or when these have arisen.
Sue would update the spreadsheet, including adding more of the annually serviced items to the first column. We can then reconsider the spreadsheet next month. At the Trustee meeting on 19th January the sub-committee was asked to obtain quotes for the car park repairs

Internet Banking
Liz had finally managed to get Alan’s signature on the letter and would take it to the bank tomorrow. Once the emergency mandate had been rescinded, Alan would need to show Liz how the “two to sign” arrangement works in practice.




Sue Trimnell
Sue is keen to begin getting all our accounts onto the new computer and is only waiting for Alan to have the time to help her with the task. Unfortunately for us, Alan has been having an extremely busy time at work.

Any Other Business
1. Music Licences Neither Sue nor Liz had been able to find a breakdown of last year’s
figures, although the cost of the two licences was £801.75 in 2016. Sue would look on Cliff’s disk and contact Cliff if necessary. Liz would look again through the papers he passed on in October.

2. E-on Cliff had been helpful in looking at the new E-on price contract which starts in early May. He suggests that we accept the proposed terms as they are quite good and the LCC needs to have its account with a reliable company. Liz will deal with this before the deadline of 7th April. The new day rate will be 14.91p per kWh (up from 12.19p) and night rate 8.98p per kWh (up from 7.04p). The standing charge remains 27p per day.

3. VOIP Sue referred Alan to the e-mail which Andrew had circulated regarding BT putting up its charges within the term of our contract. It seems we can, therefore, cancel the contract early and move to a VOIP contract sooner, as long as we do so within the next couple of weeks, i.e. within a month of notification. VOIP will be cheaper and Paul Armstrong is looking into its provision for us. Our BT contract ends in June.

4. Transaction queries Liz had one or two queries, which Alan and Sue were able to clear up. It appears that cheque 100231 to Abacus dated 19th June (probably for the original keysafe) has never been cashed.

Date of Next Meeting Monday 27th February at 7.30 p.m.

The meeting closed at 9.30 p.m.