When I talked to Gale a few weeks ago and asked about when the Beta and Aussie memberships expire, she said they were working on a way to notify ppl who purchased them that their membership was getting ready to expire, and give them options to choose from as far as renewing them. She wasn't sure if the notification would be by email or not.
They're still working on all the membership details...which is upsetting. She has no idea WHEN the memberships will start (if they haven't already)...but I think that the idea that they wouldn't start until Gold was only a rumor. Hold onto your wallets...it might be a bumpy ride...
We're still torn with the 2 monthly memberships we purchased. We do get an extra 1,000 credits, 10 more family accounts and an extra members-only item (i.e., parrot, chalkboard) each month by having the 2 memberships....but the 6-month and Yearly memberships are much cheaper. You also get an extra "welcome kit" with each of those as well. Sigh. I hope this gets worked out soon...
Flamanar
Thank-you Flamanar for this update. I certainly appreciate it. I bought into the Aussie package personally, and was thinking...how on earth is VFK going to know what to automatically bill at??
It's scary to know that nothing has been worked out yet with regards to these Memberships.
I guess watch your credit card statements very closely on this one for sure. Yikes!
If you hear of anything more, please let us know. Thanks!
Will do, AstroGigiblue. I'm assuming they have SOME of the details worked out, but not all. It's also apparent that these kinds of details are worked out elsewhere, and when they are complete, THEN Gale is informed of it. Not sure who works on this type of thing. Developers?...or a separate Billing Department?? No idea.
We have the Beta and Aussie memberships along with these 2 new One Month memberships. All are appended to the Beta...which raises more questions. When you append memberships, it makes your total TIME of your membership extend. So if you append an Aussie membership to a Beta Founders membership, you receive a total of 7 months of TIME for your membership (the Beta runs for 4 months, then the Aussie kicks in for an additional 3 months). If you were to NOT append the Aussie to the Beta, the Aussie would end after 3 months, and the Beta would end 1 month later...so the total TIME for that setup would be 4 months (because they are running alongside each other).
This does lead to more questions, though, when you append the monthly membership to the end of your existing membership. I'm assuming it would work the same as if you appended the Aussie to the Beta...but am not sure.
Also (for those that don't know), you get 20 family accounts under each of the Beta and Aussie memberships. The regular VIP memberships will net you 10 family accounts a piece. So since I have a Beta/Aussie appended membership, I have a total of 40 family accounts (20 + 20). Since I added the 2 additional One Month memberships to my existing Beta/Aussie combo, I now have a total of 60 family accounts (20 + 20 + 10 + 10).
HOWEVER: what many people aren't aware of is that you have to physically CALL them to have the additional memberships added by hand!! I had to do this when I appended the Aussie membership to the end of my Beta, and I had to do it again when I added the 2 One Month memberships to my Beta/Aussie combo. For some reason, you don't just automatically receive the extra family accounts when you purchase a new membership. NOTE: this only applies to people who are APPENDING new memberships to their existing memberships. People that just buy a new membership and don't append it to their existing membership aren't affected by this. Are we all confused now? Good.
Flamanar