AGM Treasurer’s Report

7th November 2024

Including accounts for Financial Year Ending 30th September 2024

Introduction

This document summarises the Club’s financial position for the year ending 30th September 2024; the budget for year ending 2025; and the Club’s 30+ year financial forecast. Figures are based on the first set of accounts produced following the recent change of the Club’s financial year end to 30th September.

Cash Reserves

The Club remains in a strong financial position with cash reserves of £81,000 at financial year end; of this amount, £60k is currently held in a 35-day access savings account.

Audited Accounts

The Club’s audited accounts for the financial year ending 30th September 2024 are available to view by clicking on this link.

Richard Vertigan
Treasurer, Wargrave Tennis Club
7th November 2024

The remainder of this document is divided into sections which are accessed by clicking on the button links.

– Update with final agreed budget for 2025 and beyond

Revenue

Overall the Club’s revenue amounted to just short of £53k (an increase of 13% versus YE Sep 2023). The chart below details the breakdown of these income streams with 80% generated from member subscriptions. The remaining income (20% – £10k) comes from bank interest and activities associated with coaching and court hire.

Membership Subscriptions
£43k of membership subscriptions were booked for the financial year ending 30th September 2024; this compares to a total of £38k booked in the previous financial year. For the current membership year (1 April 2024 – 31 March 25), subscriptions are currently £46k (and this figure will increase slightly as additional members join before 31 March 2025). The increase in subscriptions was largely due to the agreed membership fee increases which helped the Club offset inflation and invest in our new artificial clay courts.

Revenue from Coaching Activities
Revenue derived from our coaching agreement have contributed £5.6k in the financial year. It is anticipated that these revenues will increase in future years as the coaching business (‘OB Tennis’) continues to grow. The coaching revenue stream is derived from 10% of the annual turnover of group coaching and holiday camps, the 15% premium for any non-member who receives coaching at Wargrave, and 10% of all entry fees to any LTA tournaments.

Guest of Member and Court Hire income
£586 was generated from guest member fees (£5 per guest visitor for the day). Hiring out of courts 5 and 6 generated £954 .

Bank interest
Bank interest in the year was £2.5k. Our 35-day access account is currently earning 3.2%.

Expenditure

Non-capital expenditure in the year amounted to £36k. Coaching costs are offset against coaching income and so excluding this, the largest expenditure item was Maintenance at £5.7k. Approximately 40% of that figure was spent on maintenance equipment and the rest spent on court and clubhouse maintenance (including repairs following vandalism). Following these expenditure items, the next largest categories of expenditure were Floodlight energy (14%), Clubhouse energy (9%), Court Cleaning (7%), Tennis Balls (7%), Insurance (6%), and Affiliation Fees. These expenses are shown in the chart below, along with items amounting to the remaining 15% of expenditure.

 

Artificial Clay Courts
The most significant investment during the financial year was in two new artificial clay courts. The cost of the courts was £48k. Associated with this investment was the purchase of maintenance equipment which included a ride-on-mower (£5.2k), a new secure metal shed (£1.9k) and court maintenance equipment (£2.2k).

Pickleball
Pickleball was introduced to the Club during the year. Investment in these facilities included purchase of temporary court lines, permanent lines on court 8, nets, bats and balls. The total cost of this investment was £1.4k of which £540 was for painting the permanent lines on court 8. A Pickleball-Only membership was introduced in September and has already attracted 4 new members contributing £278 in fees. Midweek sessions are already proving to be popular for both potential new members and with existing tennis members. The pickleball facilities are also being used by the juniors on Friday nights and during the camps.

Energy
In the financial year, energy costs for floodlighting amounted to £5,131 and for the clubhouse £3,079. The Club has two providers of electricity. One for the floodlights and another for the clubhouse itself. During the year, both providers have been changed with the input of an energy broker (the switch from EDF to British Gas for clubhouse supply doesn’t start until April 2025). YuEnergy has taken over from Scottish Power as the supplier of floodlight electricity. YuEnergy will be installing a smart meter in December 2024.

Energy unit rates have reduced in the year. Floodlights are now 23.37p/kWh (from 35.76p/kWh. Clubhouse energy will reduce from 36.50/kWh to 27p/kWh). Clubhouse electricity usage rose compared to the previous financial year. Measures have been put in place to more effectively control clubhouse energy usage with the installation of App/WiFi controlled radiator switches and temperature monitors. With regard to floodlight costs, there are 4x 800W LED floodlights per court. At 23.37p/kWh, one court costs £0.75 per hour, although courts are lit in pairs so the minimum cost is £1.50/hour. When all 8 courts are floodlit the cost is therefore £6/hour. At 4 hours per night that equates to circa £25/night.

Website Hosting, Emails & Social Media
Expenditure on the Club website hosting and provision of email facilities remains low. Development of the new website was undertaken ‘in-house’ by the Chairman and Treasurer, keeping costs to a minimum. The new website implementation is designed to enable making regular updates a relatively simple process. During the year, multiple ‘lost’ Facebook and Instagram’ accounts were merged to provide a more seamless experience when updating these social media channels with Club news.

Summary 2024 v 2023

 

Financial Year 2025

Fee Increase and Forecast Revenue
The committee is proposing to keep fee increases for all membership categories from April 1st 2025 in line with the rate of inflation. This is currently between 2% and 3% depending on which measure is used. An inflationary increase is recommended to ensure that our subscription income continues to rise in line with the increasing costs of all the elements involved in running the Club, including future capital expenditure costs and of maintaining and resurfacing our current courts. With this increase in subscriptions, our forecasted income for YE 2005 is £56k with subscription income of £47k.

– YE2025 Revenue Budget

Forecast Routine Expenditure
Forecast expenditure for the year ahead is £32k. In addition to this routine expenditure of running the Club, this budget includes provision to cover the costs of new benches for the courts and patio areas. We are also looking at plans to introduce gates to the Club that will help improve security and provide a safer environment for kids coaching / kids camps. In addition, we have increased our routine maintenance budget to £5,000 to help cover the cost of unexpected routine expenditure items for our courts and clubhouse e.g. repairing lights, loos, etc.

– YE2025 Routine Expenditure Budget

2025 Capital Expenditure
Capital expenditure in the year is currently budgeted at £11k for general improvements to the clubhouse including gates, patio picnic tables (£1.7k), court benches (£2.1k) and rebowall.   

In addition, the Committee are looking at potential plans in 2025 to resurface two more courts with artificial clay, together with a potential plan to install a single Padel court from April 2025.   However, whether we progress these plans will depend on feedback from the current AGM survey and if required, via majority voting at a future EGM that would be run in January or February.

Future Capital Expenditure & Financial Model

We have developed a model that lets us look at the Club’s finances over a period of 30+ years.  This includes cost assumptions to ensure that all courts are maintained and resurfaced every 12 years, together with provision for other “large ticket items” e.g. replacing floodlighting, fencing and ongoing clubhouse repairs.

For YE 2025, there are currently no plans for significant capital investment although the Committee will respond to feedback from the AGM survey e.g. whether or not we proceed with investment of 2 further artificial clay courts. In line with the constitution, proposals for any future investment in excess of £24,000 would be subject to membership approval via an EGM voting process.

Future forecasting and planning assumes that the Club will always have a minimum level of cash reserves that matches at least 12 months of routine expenditure (a reserves to routine expenditure of 1:0). In the chart below, green bars represent cash reserves, purple bars represent capital expenditure. The second chart shows the detailed breakdown of this capital expenditure.  As you will see, with our future spending commitments, our cash reserves still build over time and are in a healthy position.