The membership card rip-off

Sorry, no boating right now, but a few choice words for the people who run scams regarding membership renewals.

The targets of our venom today are AARP and the National Rifle Association

Why these two? Because they have tried to borrow membership money from us, supposing that we are careless at best, or stupid at worst.

It works like this. We get urgent renewal notices from AARP monthly, even though our membership has 9-10 months left to run.  Those notices get more and more frequent and to make things worse, our membership card doesn't show a renewal date. If we paid for our last membership on line, we'd have to go through months of credit card statements to see when we last renewed and they are counting on the fact that most people won't bother to do that.

But why not try to trick all those dumb seniors into lending them membership dues way in advance? It's such an easy trick. We'd guess, although we can't prove, that many members of AARP are paid up many years in advance because they pay these bills when they seem to be due.

Then there's the NRA (National Rifle Association). We're permit holders and we carry a firearm on a regular basis. We love the NRA's magazine, "The American Rifleman" and we support many, but not all, of the NRA's political initiatives.

The NRA is really the leader in elaborate direct mail. We get dozens of "renewal notices" that link our membership money to avoiding the collapse of the American democracy or worse. That's fine, but the NRA begins asking for a membership renewal immediately after we've renewed and keeps on doing so every month. Their membership card does not contain a renewal date and every direct mail piece we receive suggests that we have to renew now, even though we are paid up and current and will be for many months to come.

This tendency to take customers as dumb or inattentive really offends us. We really aren't interested in loaning these organizations interest-free money. Sure, to lots of us, it's small change but there is a principle here. Offer a useful membership and ask for renewal when it is due. Pretty simple, right?

Too bad these two organizations and probably many others don't respect that simple way of doing business.

Sorry for the rant. Sometimes just opening our mails sets us off.