Should Social.coop switch its Open Collective "host" to Platform6?

@mattnoyes My impression from the conversation thus-far is little to nothing would change from the subscriber-end.

Hi @erikmoeller5 @matthewcropp As far as I'm aware having discussed this with Pia at OC, the migration is transparent as far as the end-user members/supporters are concerned. As Matt says, it's largely an 'under the hood' change. Any funds in the host's bank account will need to be manually transferred to the new host's account, and OC are happy to assist in that (they will already have our bank account details on record) so the people supporting social.coop don't need to do anything.

Great. I just wrote to Alanna at OC about how the process works. Based on that, I'll make a formal proposal to the working group, and then the main group.

Okay, I just got a response from Alanna at Open Collective about how this process works:

To switch hosts, you need to bring your Collective to $0 balance, and then it's easy. You go to 'edit collective' > fiscal host > remove your current host > add platform6 > host admin approves > done.

You can invoice out the whole amount to actually pay people/expenses, or just get someone to hold the funds and then put them back into the Collective when you've switched over. We should be able to do that with zero fees (except payment processor fees). If the Platform6 host admin isn't sure how to do any of this, put them in touch with me.

All your members' recurring subscriptions will be unaffected and they don't need to take any action.

Seems like the hard part is figuring out someone to hold the funds during the process. I just asked Alanna about details of fees for that, if OC or P6 were to manage the process.

@graham2 is P6 on board for moving forward on this?

Absolutely.
We have a board meeting later today where I can re-confirm our desire to actively support this move, and also consider any options for how to we might be able to facilitate moving the funds at lowest cost.

More from Alanna:

Normally, we get someone from the Collective to hold the funds, and we aren't usually able to transfer directly from host to host as it can cause a bit of an admin headache. If you need to transfer the funds direct to the new host, as opposed to using them up on expenses as a way to zero out the balance or having an individual hold them and then put them back, I can look into what the options are.

For payment processor fees, if the transfer is within the US and we do a manual payment, Paypal won't charge fees. But Platform6 in UK based, meaning an international transfer. In that case, we can transfer using bank wire, Paypal, Payoneer, or Transferwise, and they all have different fees.

Open Collective doesn't charge any platform fees for money going out. After changing hosts, if you put funds back in through the front door (via credit card) the 5% platform fee + stripe fees will be applied automatically. If you do a manual transfer (any way other than credit card), whether it's us sending the funds or you holding and transferring them to Platform6, it's up to them whether they charge a fee on the transaction.

Thanks, @graham2, let us know how it goes. It seems like the main issue is the international wire transfer. Have a good board meeting!

Hi again. Yes, moving the funds that are sitting in the OC host account seems to be the main sticking point. One option that we thought might work on this is that at an agreed point in time Platform 6 could submit an invoice to social.coop for the balance in your account. Upon approval those funds could then be paid to the Platform 6 Paypal account, and from there we could easily move that money into our bank account. Paypal would charge a fee for that transaction of course, and there would be some cost for the conversion from USD to GBP, but this might be the simplest route.
Although Alanna seems to be suggesting (not sure) that we could go down this route but not use Paypal and OC could make the transfer manually using Transferwise or similar, which is probably cheaper.

The alternative is that perhaps one of your core contributors claims the money as an expense. It would still then be paid out via Paypal, so they still take their slice, and the money is then moved into a US bank account, from where you then need to move it to our UK account. I don't know what US banks charge for international transfers. Some countries have really low fees on this type of stuff, while others can be quite costly. But that route feels relatively more expensive. Again, I'm unclear as to whether Alanna is offering to make a manual payment or not.

Transferwise, https://transferwise.com/ - which I've used to send euros to suppliers in the eurozone, is pretty good and quite low cost. Their website suggests that moving $6500 (which is roughly what OC shows as your current balance) to a GBP account will cost $30.51 and they suggest that this is up to $213 cheaper than the average bank.

We wouldn't charge any fees for facilitating any of this on the assumption we don't meet any costs in the process (it is possible that our bank might want to charge a fee, but I'll check that out) and if the funds are paid directly into our account rather than through the OC front door there wouldn't be any Stripe fees at that point.
Hope this helps.
The whole thing makes crypto look increasingly attractive!

Okay, it sounds like the Transferwise approach is probably best. So in my proposal I'll say that the total cost of the transfer would be under $50, probably close to $30. Does that sound correct to you? Just want to confirm before I draft the proposal.

On the assumption that you can get the funds into Transferwise (i.e.either direct from OC's account or from one of your core team's accounts) at no cost to you, then it sounds do-able.