Trip Administration

1. Overnight trip descriptions and the Overnight Trip Workbook must be submitted to the Overnight Trip Committee (OTC) by July 31 for the upcoming season, or a date provided by the Overnight Trip Committee. Once reviewed and approved the OTC will submit the trip description and cost for website publication.
2. Reservation costs for booked facilities and services, including all projected costs for the trip shall be included on the Expenses tab of the workbook for the trip. Notify the OTC of any changes after submittal. This could affect the price for participants, and costs or operating income to the club.
3. Trip leaders should be prepared to represent their trips at the October ONC-PDX club meeting.
4. The Trip Participant Worksheet should be kept up to date to show status of who’s going, who cancelled, etc., and must be finalized prior to the beginning of the trip.
5. Complete any expense updates within 30 days of the trip completion, and submit a check request form with receipts, if necessary, to the Club Bookkeeper.
6. Trip leaders should provide the OTC with feedback about trip outcomes, including behavior problems, if any, that may need to be documented more fully for future reference.
7. A subset of overnight trips, deemed “complex trips”, are typically international or long lead time trips with planning difficulties due to unknown costs or exchange rates. These trips will be posted with a range of minimum to maximum price, with trip participants paying the ONC-PDX trip goal price. The recommended trip deposit is 25% of ONC goal price or actual pre-trip costs incurred by ONC, whichever is greater. Trip leaders will establish required fees and deposits in consultation with the OTC. Such fees and deposits need to be determined before the trip can be published.

Leadership Development

1. Trip leaders are encouraged to enlist a co-leader for their trip to help with trip planning, trip logistics, and possibly take over the trip should the trip leader be unable to. The co-leader can be an experienced trip leader who wishes to learn the trip or a person desiring to become a trip leader. Co-leaders on trips of 12 or more may receive a discount, generally 50% rounded up, of the published trip participant cost. A co-leader is required on trips of 16 and greater in number.
2. To ensure safe and enjoyable outcomes, trip leaders are encouraged to enlist trail leader assistance for unusually large trips (e.g. Crater Lake). The trail leading assistants will not be considered co-leaders for trip discount purposes but will gain experience necessary to serve as co-leaders or trip leaders in the future.

Trip Cancellation – Process for Trip Leaders

Refer to the Overnight Trip Policies for details of the cancellation policy. The steps below are in line with that and outline what to do when someone cancels their place on an overnight trip.

1. Update their status on the Trip Participants tab in the Workbook. Initially set it to “cancelled no replacement“. Status will change again when/if a replacement is found and the trip is full.
2. Contact any waitlist people to see if anyone would like to fill an opening. If the waitlist is exhausted, advertise any openings on the forum. Do this even if the trip has other openings
3. If someone wants to sign up, they may do so directly online if the trip page shows spots remaining. If there are no open spots remaining, contact the web admin (website@pdxnordic.org) so they can open a slot for them to pay online.
4. Once the web admin has opened a slot (they will notify you that it’s set up and whether there is a password), let any replacement person know to go to the club’s website and that particular trip, and sign up.
5. The trip leader will get a notification email when someone has successfully signed up and paid. If not updated, change the replacement person’s status in the workbook to one of the “paid” categories, fill in the amount paid and update the payment type (generally to ‘online’).
6. When all open spots have been taken and the trip is filled, update the status for whoever cancelled from “no replacement” to one of the “with replacement” selections. The refund column will show the amount they get back as defined by the trip policies.
7. Send a completed check request form to the Club’s Bookkeeper as indicated on the form. Filling out the form should be self-explanatory. Leaders can get the cancelee’s address from the participants tab. The Bookeeper should check the trip workbook prior to issuing the check.

More on cancellations and other tips in the Leadership Handbook.