Pricing history and Bursary scheme

BARA Pricing History

It was decided at the outset that our efforts should be principally directed at creating a pricing structure that is free from any deals and special offers to selected individuals, as this can be very unfair and helps to create divisions amongst young athletes and parents. This is very important to the academy if we are to maintain our vision of fostering traditional values of respect, courtesy, responsibility, fairness and self-discipline within a caring sporting environment. Yet we wanted to be able to make training cheaper for those athletes who wanted to put more into their sport and spend more time training to attain a higher technical level.

Our sliding scale fee structure has worked quite well in this respect, although it has been difficult to administer as credits/refunds had to be calculated from previous training weeks, when more weeks were booked at a later date. We therefore are stopping this practice and credits/refunds will no longer be given if more training weeks are booked at a later date. All weeks must now be booked in advance and the appropriate deposit received to benefit from the sliding scale of reducing fees. To make things even easier our sliding scale now only goes up to 10 weeks

BARA Children and Part Time Junior FIS Athletes Bursary and Special Full Time Junior FIS program package.

From August 2006 we are introducing discounted training schemes(Bursaries) to enhance the idea of reduced fees, These are designed for the more serious athlete who wants to spend more time training at the academy and who can commit to a long term training program. The bursaries are designed to discount the 10 week training fee with the available discount being increased considerably depending on the training week option chosen. The number of weeks when totalled together can include spring, summer, autumn glacier training and fitness training weeks, as well as the British race camp weeks. The academy from this summer is opened all year round and has a full annual training program devised by our coachs. The price for the off-season training weeks (May to October) for athletes on the bursaries are to be set at a specially low price. The pricing structure is designed to make the cost as low as possible, especially off-season, which will allow more athletes whether junior or children athletes to consider following a year round professional training program. The price will me made up of a weekly charge paid throughout the season plus the additional costs incurred attending race camps. The bursary scheme has been designed to incorporate our ethos of creating a fair cost environment for all athletes/parents involved in alpine ski racing and as such are open to all registered athletes whatever their age or ability. There will be a number of bursaries in each age category awarded each year for both part time and full time athletes and will be given on a first come basis.

The bursaries will offer a substantial reduction of published fees in return for a commitment from the athlete and parent for periods of two and three years. The latter obviously offering the greater reduction in fees. The reduction will be based on a percentage based discount on published fees with the discount increasing depending on the number of training weeks booked. We are also offering a special full year training package for full time FIS Junior racers. The published fees at the inception of a bursary or all year junior program will be frozen for the full time of the bursary/program. Therefore apart from the discounted reduction, the athlete will also benefit from not having to incur a price increase for two or three years, depending on the bursary applied for. This will help enormously with financial planning and hopefully go a long way to easing the financial burden of competing in a high cost sport.

For these bursaries to work and to protect there integrity, allowing us to ensure they remain viable for athletes for many years to come, there needs to be a disincentive to withdraw from the bursary so as not to allow anyone the temptation to benefit from a few weeks cheap training and then pull out. Therefore athletes and parents taking up these bursaries will be asked to enter in to an agreement whereby they will agree to pay the training weeks taken under the bursary at the full published rate, if they were to pull out before the agreed ending date. Therefore there is no financial risk or penalty to the athlete or their parent as they would only pay the normal published price under the sliding scale for the weeks taken if they were to pull out early. This does not apply to Athletes retiring from the sport or those taking up places in the British Junior or Senior National Team. The bursary would also be frozen if the athlete is out for a season on injury status. Parents can pull out of the Bursary at any time.

If you would like further details on the bursaries and the fee reductions on offer, please send your enquiry by email to training@alpine-racing.co.uk