Members on line support

Copy of article from main website, article section:-

Although most of the requirements of a member can be dealt with by the consultant supporting them or other arrangements that have been made, it is very useful to also have access to a wide range of help and resources over the internet on occasions. 

Take for example a person looking at plots and considering suitability, although the consultant will  probably already have given them some printed copies of workbooks to analyze sites, they may suddenly want more or need access to other workbooks looking at a different type of site, or to forms not in the form packs that they have. While a member could call and have them posted or emailed this is slow and not so ideal as having a personal website that most of your requirements can be met directly from and where additional information is also able to be linked. 

There are also occasions when the consultant supporting the member may want to allow them to see something, and a quick phone call or email telling them that new information is at hand and connecting the information file to the users member area is the ideal way to handle it. Another example is where the consultant has photographs he wishes to share, in this case he puts them onto a special site and the site shows both small copies and the ability to look at larger copies as well. The consultant then just asks for a link to be added to the members area to allow them to access these. In this way he can share photos and information with groups of members if he wishes. 

The club can also provide sub websites and passwords so that some members can upload information, for the club, for contactors dealing with your build or for sharing with groups of other members. Build groups would often have one of these sites as well, so all members of it are aware of what is happening on site, progress reports, photographs, and more can be included.

So how does this work

In order to give members the best support that w e can, we have the capability to support each on line, to access this personal area, the member enters the members website for the country they have joined, or the country's member website where they are currently accessing services. If this is over several countries they can use any, and the sites will link them together.

What we do is to in effect create a sub website of the members website for every member when they join, initially it just has some links to member information, but as their needs are identified, more can be added. Many of the service providers are able to access these areas and add links or update pages.

The web address of the members personal website we create for them is:-

www.members.self-build-homes-club.co.uk/uk/member number password, 
with no spaces

Example:-

• If you had member number m12345 and your password was ratbag 

• You would use www.members.self-build-homes-club.co.uk/uk/m12345ratbag 

• The colors are not significant they have been added in the hope of making it easier to understand

• There are no spaces

Although this looks complicated, it is not, it is  'members' and dot in front of our normal main website address, a / followed by UK and a second / just saying that you registered in the UK, then your member number, and finally your personal password that has been defined between you and the consultant supporting you. There are no spaces at all in this. If it does not work, the usual reason is that you have added a space somewhere or the dot after members has become a comma.

The shortcut way to get this is to take a link to the members site from this website, which just gives you some information and a reminder of the format and to then change the web address you are  looking at in your browser by adjusting the end part. 

Once you are into it, you can remember this address by adding it to your browser favorites.

There are some limitations on the use of this, in that these are not secure sites, but they are far more secure than normal websites, in that search engine robots are told not to include them and guessing the number and password would be very difficult. There is no path through the webs that anyone could follow and member numbers are not issued in sequence, but in a random order.

You should always use this to access member only information, as opposed to remembering site addresses for books or forms, as we move information about, so as to provide added security and the links within your members pages are updated automatically, every time any item you have links to, is moved.

What is accessible will vary from member to member and grow over time. To start with it may be just a single page, but over time or with several projects you could end up with quite a few pages, but they will all be linked together so easy to follow. 

Where you have projects across countries a new sub web is created for each country you are operating in and these others link from your main member pages, and back to them, so although it could be apart of several websites it all operates as if it was one. However the local commissioned providers only need to update information onto their local sites, and may not have access to other sites outside of this.