Larry's Blog Pages

December 4, 2009

The price of convenience...

So I went to register for a race online today. The timing matrix went a little something like this...

If I paid before Nov 1 - $37.00 (missed that one)
If I paid after Nov 1 - $42.00 (I am in this bracket)
If I pay race day - $48 (cash only)

I figure I may as well save $6 and sign up today but as I get through the registration screens, I finally come to the invoice which states there will be a $4.20 service fee for online registration! Last time I checked, this is 10%! I did some very rough math based on some guessing (200 people registered at $37, 300 people @ $42) and the high side of this would be a $2000.00 pay out to the online company.

I am not sure if they get hit with the credit card fees (or if the race promoter has to pay that in the service) but it is still a pretty big take away at the expense of us athletes. And they don't even offer American Express as a payment option!

To me, I would rather pay an extra $1.80 that goes directly to the race even if I miss out on the door prize if 500 people register before I do.

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