Dear Division 1307/Rogers Arena Division members.
First of all, I would like to thank you all for your patience as we navigate new waters with the conversion from Better Impact to the new Volunteer Management System (VMS for short)
I am told that all of the information has been migrated to the new system. Although some of you still are experiencing some problems, I assure you that all issues that have come to me have already been sent to our provincial head quarters for resolving. Any new issues should be reported as per the new system outline in the email you may have recently received, and which has been copied below:
(I have taken the liberty to highlight our division specific information into the copied email) :
"Good morning volunteers,
We hope this email finds you all well.
As you know, for the last six months, we have been transitioning from using Better Impact to using the new volunteer system, VMS. We have completed data migration and are ready to begin closing the Better Impact account.
Please review the following for details on the final stages of this change:
What is changing: Better Impact will be closed and accounts will be inaccessible.
When is this change taking place: August 31st, 2024
What will this impact: No impact. Hours, updated qualifications, and contact information VMS.
What do you need to do: If you have already logged into your VMS account, there is no required action at this time. If you have not yet accessed your account, please log in and verify your information is correct and up-to-date.
What to do if you have outstanding hours: Please do not log any missing hours in Better Impact, as these will not automatically be imported to the new system. If you have unreported volunteer hours, please follow the steps for additional support below.
How to request additional support: Please email our Provincial Administrative Officer at pao@sjabcy.ca. Be sure to copy your Divisional Superintendent (ds.d1307@sjabcy.ca) and include the following information:
Full Name
Count ID Number (if known)
Email Address
Division (1307)
Full Description of VMS Issue
Thank you for your continued cooperation and support as we enter the final stages of the transition to VMS.
Sincerely,
The Community Services Team"
As you know, we too have been discovering VMS at the same time you have so we appreciate your patience. We unfortunately have not received any additional training, and are figuring out the same information with you, in addition to the back end of the system which is proving to be an interesting challenge.
For events, once you sign up on the VMS, you will automatically be confirmed and expected to show up. If you do not show up, you will be contacted by the duty commander or myself, to ensure your safety. If you need to cancel a shift, please do so on VMS, although you may still see the shift, you will show cancelled on our end.
For logging hours, when you sign up on an event, the hours for the event are automatically added as “pending hours” once the event is complete, one of the officers (usually Tannis our Admin Officer or myself) will approve your hours after we have added the travel time. This means that you no longer need to worry about adding hours yourself, and it means that your patience may also be required as there is a significant amount of work that we need to do on the back end to get everything squared away.
If and when you are doing events elsewhere, please remember to email rogers.arena@sjabcy.ca to let us know. In cases where the event is in our VMS, (where you may have signed up) we would not be aware to look in and approve hours as there is no notification system. We would have to manually look you up, find your hours and approve them manually. In events which are not in our divisions list, we need to contact other divisions, ask them to add our division to their events, and manipulate a few settings to allow our members to log the hours. This is done after the fact and once the event is shared, would require you the volunteer to add your own hours/shift with travel time.
As you can tell the process is quite time intensive and not everyone is as aware of the system as we now are, which is why we need the emails for tracking and ensuring you are getting properly compensated for your volunteering.
As of recently, division membership is now capped. This means that if we have inactive members, they will need to start doing shifts and training if they want to remain a volunteer. We no longer have the luxury of keeping volunteers on the roster who are not remaining active. We have many events coming up and need our volunteers to step up, especially now that we are no longer in the public forum of team Initiatives as it was on better impact.
Although we can request help from other divisions, we do need to show that we can handle our responsibilities as a division and for that, we need our members to pick up shifts when they see that we are thinly staffed.
All inactive volunteers will be removed periodically, with the next batch set for August 31st 2024. This will be mostly for the members that have not replied to my multiple texts and emails regarding switching to VMS.
Training will be out soon, and our training officer apologizes for the delay as she is finishing her journey to become a fully licensed paramedic while working full time.
Our website has also been updated and is now a one-stop-shop for you our volunteer. Please check it out at www.raodivision1307.ca
Thats all for now,
All the best and thanks for sticking with us.
Sincerely,
Philippe Lurol, MStJ,
Primary Care Paramedic
Divisional Superintendent
Division 1307, Rogers Arena Operations
St John Ambulance BC/Yukon