Hi,
I am involved in the running of a small rural sports club. We don't have a large number of members but do have adult and underage teams for which there is a running cost including travel and team affiliations.
We held our last fund raiser 2 years ago and were lucky enough to be in a position not to need the funds up until recently.
The fundraiser was held in a local pub (the owner was an active member of our club at the time and the kit sponsor - not sure if the pub is his or his fathers). We were lucky enough to raise nearly €3000 which would have gone some way towards updating our club kits and paying expenses for 1-2 years.
As it was a weekend when we ran the fundraiser the money was left in the safe of the pub and ended up staying there.
We did not have an immediate need for the funds so we continued to use our existing funds until the time came around to start using the fundraiser money (would have been around the start of the next season).
Thats when the problems started. We have not been able to get any sort of contact with the (ex) member holding the funds. He does not answer phone calls and having met him coincidentally in a carpark last autumn he advised the money had been moved to his house and to call for it any time. Since that time he has not been at the house on any occasion that we have called and has never answered his phone or responded to any messages left. We have now sent a letter asking for the money followed by a registered letter. There has been no response to either and an Post contacted me today to say the registered letter had not been delivered.
How should we proceed from here? At this point should we be engaging a solicitor to initiate proceedings?
Its sad to get to this point as we would all have considered ourselves friends and I just find it so hard to believe that it has come to this. The club can not afford to write off the money as we now find ourselves in debt.
Thanks for any advice you can offer!
I am involved in the running of a small rural sports club. We don't have a large number of members but do have adult and underage teams for which there is a running cost including travel and team affiliations.
We held our last fund raiser 2 years ago and were lucky enough to be in a position not to need the funds up until recently.
The fundraiser was held in a local pub (the owner was an active member of our club at the time and the kit sponsor - not sure if the pub is his or his fathers). We were lucky enough to raise nearly €3000 which would have gone some way towards updating our club kits and paying expenses for 1-2 years.
As it was a weekend when we ran the fundraiser the money was left in the safe of the pub and ended up staying there.
We did not have an immediate need for the funds so we continued to use our existing funds until the time came around to start using the fundraiser money (would have been around the start of the next season).
Thats when the problems started. We have not been able to get any sort of contact with the (ex) member holding the funds. He does not answer phone calls and having met him coincidentally in a carpark last autumn he advised the money had been moved to his house and to call for it any time. Since that time he has not been at the house on any occasion that we have called and has never answered his phone or responded to any messages left. We have now sent a letter asking for the money followed by a registered letter. There has been no response to either and an Post contacted me today to say the registered letter had not been delivered.
How should we proceed from here? At this point should we be engaging a solicitor to initiate proceedings?
Its sad to get to this point as we would all have considered ourselves friends and I just find it so hard to believe that it has come to this. The club can not afford to write off the money as we now find ourselves in debt.
Thanks for any advice you can offer!