JUNE 2004

Duties of a Recording Partner in an Investment Club

DEFINITION OF A FINANCIAL CLUB'S "SECRETARY" OR RECORDING PARTNER

Dene Miller Alden, Assistant Director, OKI Chapter NAIC

The job description of all officers of a financial club should be outlined and defined in the club's Bylaws and Operation Procedures.

The financial club that I belong to defines this position: "Recording Partner: Duty is to keep a record of the actions authorized by the partners, to maintain partnership files, to notify partners of meetings and other activities, to advise absentee partners of proceedings of the meetings, pertinent news and information and to mail the financial report to absentee members after each meeting."

Other duties (from articles on BI's website on starting a financial club) are "to file club entity with the State, safekeeping the original partnership agreement and signature pages, the original state and federal certificates, concise record of the minutes of every meeting along with any correspondence, i.e. resignation letters and letters requesting information or membership forms from prospective new members."

These duties are straightforward and are not in need of any elaboration. The only area I want to comment on is the monthly minutes.

I like to keep the minutes to one page, if possible. I also format the page so there should be space on the left side of the page for hole punching if the document is to be filed in a ring binder.

After a title giving the name of the club, date and location of the meeting, I note the attendees at the meeting and if proxies that are submitted by absent members. This information is placed in an attendance matrix (set up manually or in an excel file) with a cell for each member at each meeting showing their attendance record and proxies issued.

The body of the minutes organizationally will follow the meeting's agenda. Only a brief description of each segment is needed unless there is official business and a voting procedure.

In this age of emails, my pet peeve is not getting the minutes out to the partners in a timely manner. When all partners are computerized, the operational portion of the "reading of the minutes" can be done prior to the meeting and only the corrections or additions are requested, thus allowing more productive time in the meeting. Minutes should be posted to all members as soon as possible, preferably no later than one week prior to the next meeting. If they are issued at the last moment, partners may not have enough time to act upon items or prepare for the next meeting.