received record with incorrect address

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jirp
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Re: received record with incorrect address

#11

Post by jirp »

lajackson wrote:
jirp wrote:Back when I took over as clerk we had 2 or 3 dozen families in the ward who's records had been moved in that way. I tried to be sure on my watch it never happened with outgoing records. If that means we sit on records who we know are elsewhere for a decade, oh well.
I would not wait a decade. If I knew the member had moved and I did not have a good address, I would follow the instructions for moving the record without an address, then send it.

Why? Church headquarters will wait a month or 2 and ship it back to you.(learned the hard way early) If you really get lucky they will wait a few years before shipping it back. But what ever happens it is up to you to solve or sit on. We got 100's of bad addresses either fixed, found or the records shipped out to an indentified location but time and energy is limited and the unknowns can sit till others are cleaned up.
russellhltn wrote:
jirp wrote:Under old MLS you could override and send it one with no address or the most common other answers were to repeat the town and state as a street address or use the new wards church building address or the bishops address in place of a real address.
If I got a record like that, there's a good chance it would be flying back so fast that there would be collateral damage upon impact. I realize the sending ward may not have every last detail, but if there's no clues to track down the member, that's just low.
Most of them didn't happen during my time so it left them for me to deal with. We did eventually get most of them found and fixed but it took a lot.
lajackson
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Re: received record with incorrect address

#12

Post by lajackson »

jirp wrote:Why?
Because that is what we have been asked to do. If I was making progress on finding them, of course I would not send them back, but I would not take ten years to do it.

As for the Church policy of returning records to the ward that sent them in, unless the Church provided new information to help track down the member, I would immediately send back the record, having already done everything I could to locate the member.

I once received a letter from the Membership Department informing me that membership records were to be retained in the ward that covered the address on the membership record (they are). I sent the record back, with a letter informing them that the 2" by 3" real estate described as the address on the membership record (a Post Office Box), was located in another ward, that the U.S. Postal Service would not provide the real address of the owner, and that the Church was welcome to see if they could pry the information out of the Post Office.

They sent the record to the other ward with the Post Office, who followed the eight- or nine-step process, could not locate the member, and then sent it back.

Please don't get me wrong. We make a valiant effort to locate every member for every membership record we receive.
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sbradshaw
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Re: received record with incorrect address

#13

Post by sbradshaw »

Having records in your ward of members who aren't actually there also causes the quarterly report and unit statistics to be inaccurate.
Samuel Bradshaw • If you desire to serve God, you are called to the work.
russellhltn
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Re: received record with incorrect address

#14

Post by russellhltn »

jirp wrote:Why? Church headquarters will wait a month or 2 and ship it back to you.(learned the hard way early)
Yes, they've started doing that since 2013. I have to wonder how successful that's been.
Have you searched the Help Center? Try doing a Google search and adding "site:churchofjesuschrist.org/help" to the search criteria.

So we can better help you, please edit your Profile to include your general location.
jirp
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Re: received record with incorrect address

#15

Post by jirp »

russellhltn wrote:
jirp wrote:Why? Church headquarters will wait a month or 2 and ship it back to you.(learned the hard way early)
Yes, they've started doing that since 2013. I have to wonder how successful that's been.
The actually must have started it earlier because I got my first records back in late 2011 or early 2012.
lajackson wrote:Because that is what we have been asked to do.
I tried is all I can say here. I know what I was supposed to do but there wasn't enough of me to reach all expectations. If the lord wanted more he either needed to provide better help or call someone better suited to the task.
lajackson
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Re: received record with incorrect address

#16

Post by lajackson »

jirp wrote:They actually must have started it earlier because I got my first records back in late 2011 or early 2012.
They were doing it in 1985. This is nothing new.
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aebrown
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Re: received record with incorrect address

#17

Post by aebrown »

jirp wrote:I tried is all I can say here. I know what I was supposed to do but there wasn't enough of me to reach all expectations. If the lord wanted more he either needed to provide better help or call someone better suited to the task.
The responsibility for resolving issues with records for people who perhaps do not live in the ward does not fall exclusively on the ward clerk, or even on all the clerks. It is a ward council responsibility, backed by all the organizations represented in the ward council, which includes the entire ward. Ultimately, it is the bishop's responsibility to organize the effort so that it can be accomplished in wisdom and order.

The advice given in Mosiah 4:27 is always relevant: "And see that all these things are done in wisdom and order; for it is not requisite that a man should run faster than he has strength. And again, it is expedient that he should be diligent, that thereby he might win the prize; therefore, all things must be done in order."
cspinfo@telus.net
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Re: received record with incorrect address

#18

Post by cspinfo@telus.net »

On occasion, a member leaving the ward will not divulge their new address (for whatever personal reason) but the person will say that they're moving into a particular ward. In the absence of new address info, what else can one do in such cases but to move it to the new ward without an address (& explain why in the comments, if there's enough room to do so)?
scgallafent
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Re: received record with incorrect address

#19

Post by scgallafent »

cspinfo@telus.net wrote:On occasion, a member leaving the ward will not divulge their new address (for whatever personal reason) but the person will say that they're moving into a particular ward. In the absence of new address info, what else can one do in such cases but to move it to the new ward without an address (& explain why in the comments, if there's enough room to do so)?
You could contact the clerk of that ward directly and give him the information you have.
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