Tournament Deposit
What is it?
It is a $50.00 per child charge at registration time that is totally refundable at season’s end if the player was available for their ENTIRE tournament weekend. Partial availability won’t suffice.
(i.e. “He can be there for the Friday night game but we are leaving early Saturday and cannot be at the 3:00pm game”).
Tournament Weekend?
There are two weekends in question. As which levels play on each weekend has not be decided yet as it has to be negotiated with three or four other associations, we cannot say at this time which level is playing on which weekend. That information will be known however before the season starts May 1. Parents will be given the option of continuing or getting their money back at that time. Once the season starts however there will be no refunds.
Which teams?
The tournament deposit will be invoked for all players at the Mites age group and older (8 or 9 on the 1st of January).
Refund-When?
If players are available for their ENTIRE tournament they will receive their full Tournament Deposit in cash immediately after the season (usually the Saturday following). It would be at the same time they are returning their ball pants.
Like the Ball Pants refund, a representative can pick up the deposit but they will be required to initial receipt of the money.
Reason:
Players are disappearing at Tournament time in alarming quantities and are pushing teams to the verge of collapse. The only option available to coaches is to ask kids from the lower age groups to come up and cover their rosters for the tournament.
This system has been used for many, many years and it was usually sufficient to get us through. The last couple of years however has seen this problem grow into a full fledged epidemic. Teams that they would ask to draw kids from are undergoing the same problem and in many cases it can be even worse. Teams teeter on the verge of collapse, even with the call-ups.
We attempted to inform parents last year at registration about the importance of the tournament but it seemed to have little effect. Hence the incorporation of the Tournament Deposit which we are hoping will, if not solve the problem, at least alleviate it a bit.