Membership Record in Wrong Ward

I recently discovered two members who do not reside in our ward but are listed as members of our ward. After contacting the ward clerk for membership with this discovery he told me that one of the member's records had been sent to headquarters three times but they keep sending it back to the ward. The other member lives within a few blocks of the first and both are at least a half mile outside our ward boundaries. Both members are inactive. Both members' records are complete to include a full address. There is nothing about their records that we are aware of that would cause Salt Lake to think they should be in our ward.

The questions then are: How should a clerk get a member's record moved out of the ward for a situation such as this? Why would Salt Lake continue to return a member's record to a ward in which they do not reside when the address for the member is clear and without problem?

Since I just notified the clerk yesterday and he replied today I do not have the details on what he did exactly in moving the record out of the ward. I want to make some sort of recommendation to him that will direct a better result. Can comments about where the record should go be included when a record is moved out? Will that help in a situation where Salt Lake seems to think they belong in our ward? I do not know if the ward in which they actually reside (still in our stake) will request the records because they are inactive members.

jdlessley wrote:IThe questions then are: How should a clerk get a member's record moved out of the ward for a situation such as this? Why would Salt Lake continue to return a member's record to a ward in which they do not reside when the address for the member is clear and without problem?

Has the clerk tried looking up the correct unit on maps.lds.org, then transferring the record to that specific unit?

jdlessley wrote:I recently discovered two members who do not reside in our ward but are listed as members of our ward. After contacting the ward clerk for membership with this discovery he told me that one of the member's records had been sent to headquarters three times but they keep sending it back to the ward. The other member lives within a few blocks of the first and both are at least a half mile outside our ward boundaries. Both members are inactive. Both members' records are complete to include a full address. There is nothing about their records that we are aware of that would cause Salt Lake to think they should be in our ward.

The questions then are: How should a clerk get a member's record moved out of the ward for a situation such as this? Why would Salt Lake continue to return a member's record to a ward in which they do not reside when the address for the member is clear and without problem?

Since I just notified the clerk yesterday and he replied today I do not have the details on what he did exactly in moving the record out of the ward. I want to make some sort of recommendation to him that will direct a better result. Can comments about where the record should go be included when a record is moved out? Will that help in a situation where Salt Lake seems to think they belong in our ward? I do not know if the ward in which they actually reside (still in our stake) will request the records because they are inactive members.

If the proper ward is in your stake, I see no reason to involve CHQ in the matter anymore. I would do two things:

1. Make sure that the ward boundaries are correct by using maps.lds.org for the addresses of the people in question. I know this may seem like a long shot, but we had a case in our stake where the official boundaries did not match the assumed boundaries for several years. We did not notice this until someone moved in between two members of one ward, but their records were automatically put in another ward. We discovered that the boundaries were wrong, and so we made the official correction.
2. Work with the ward clerk of the ward that should have the records. It really shouldn't matter whether the people are inactive or not -- their records should be in the right ward. The other ward can request them, or if you are absolutely certain that you know the correct ward, you can move them out to that ward. You can move records to a specific ward, and they will indeed go to that ward, even if there is some discrepancy in the address or boundaries. Under no circumstances should you "move them to headquarters" when you have an address and believe it to be correct, and even know the appropriate ward.

boomerbubba wrote:Has the clerk tried looking up the correct unit on maps.lds.org, then transferring the record to that specific unit?

See the following post for more information on how to use maps.lds.org to find out the unit number the address is assigned to:

http://tech.lds.org/forum/showthread.ph ... #post18744

Alan_Brown wrote:If the proper ward is in your stake, I see no reason to involve CHQ in the matter anymore. I would do two things:

Make sure that the ward boundaries are correct by using maps.lds.org for the addresses of the people in question.

We definitely know the boundaries of the wards. There is no question there.

Alan_Brown wrote:Work with the ward clerk of the ward that should have the records. It really shouldn't matter whether the people are inactive or not -- their records should be in the right ward. The other ward can request them, or if you are absolutely certain that you know the correct ward, you can move them out to that ward. You can move records to a specific ward, and they will indeed go to that ward, even if there is some discrepancy in the address or boundaries.

I wanted to make sure records could be sent to directly to a ward and not pass through Church headquarters before making a recommendation to the clerk. As far as being inactive is concerned - it is an issue and has been an issue in the past due to the large number of inactives in the correct ward. I know they will not request the record if they know the member is inactive. But knowing a record can be sent directly to a ward definitely will be my recommendation to the clerk.

jdlessley wrote:We definitely know the boundaries of the wards. There is no question there.

I didn't intend to imply that there was any lack of knowledge on your part. But as I related in my experience, sometimes everyone knows and acknowledges what the boundaries are, but still the official boundaries at CHQ are somehow different from that. Yet it is the official CHQ boundaries that are used to send records to wards. That's why I suggested that you check the boundaries using maps.lds.org -- not that it would affect what you would do with these particular records, but just to make sure that there is no boundary error that would lead to other problems like these misdirected records in the future.

Alan_Brown wrote:I didn't intend to imply that there was any lack of knowledge on your part. But as I related in my experience, sometimes everyone knows and acknowledges what the boundaries are, but still the official boundaries at CHQ are somehow different from that. Yet it is the official CHQ boundaries that are used to send records to wards. That's why I suggested that you check the boundaries using maps.lds.org -- not that it would affect what you would do with these particular records, but just to make sure that there is no boundary error that would lead to other problems like these misdirected records in the future.

Sorry if it sounded like I was challenging anything. I should have said that I checked the boundaries against the Church information using LDSmaps before I even contacted the clerk and then again using the procedure you, mkmurray, and boomerbubba described. I even talked to both bishops to make sure their understanding of the boundaries was as I understood them and had checked them. Keeping things brief just doesn't come across in a positive way sometimes.

jdlessley wrote:I wanted to make sure records could be sent to directly to a ward and not pass through Church headquarters before making a recommendation to the clerk.

Nit-pick: All record transfers go though CHQ, or at least the area office. However, if you specify the destination ward, then CHQ will honor that even if they think it's out of the boundaries.

If possible, you might want to put a note on the transfer: DO NOT RETURN.

RussellHltn wrote:Nit-pick: All record transfers go though CHQ, or at least the area office. However, if you specify the destination ward, then CHQ will honor that even if they think it's out of the boundaries.

If possible, you might want to put a note on the transfer: DO NOT RETURN.

Right.

But aren't you only allowed to be a note if the Destination Address is not known?

mkmurray wrote:But aren't you only allowed to be a note if the Destination Address is not known?

That's why I said "if possible"

But that does bring up a good point. Just how is the record being sent? If the clerk is sending it to another ward and not supplying the address (because it's already correct) then the ward receiving it isn't going to see the address and of there's a good chance they are going to send it back.

RussellHltn wrote:That's why I said "if possible"

But that does bring up a good point. Just how is the record being sent? If the clerk is sending it to another ward and not supplying the address (because it's already correct) then the ward receiving it isn't going to see the address and of there's a good chance they are going to send it back.

When you send a record, you supply the address if you can. You only omit the address if you don't know it (in which case -- and only that case -- you can supply a comment).

So in the case at hand, the record should be sent to the other ward, and the address should be supplied, since it is known. So the receiving ward will see the address.

Without knowing what your ward clerk did, I would suspect that the reason the record keeps coming back is because he is sending it to the other ward, but a clerk in the other ward thinks it in your ward boundaries and keeps sending it back.

This has happened to me more than once - usually because it was outside our stake.

Alan_Brown wrote:

RussellHltn wrote:But that does bring up a good point. Just how is the record being sent? If the clerk is sending it to another ward and not supplying the address (because it's already correct) then the ward receiving it isn't going to see the address and of there's a good chance they are going to send it back.

When you send a record, you supply the address if you can. You only omit the address if you don't know it (in which case -- and only that case -- you can supply a comment).

So in the case at hand, the record should be sent to the other ward, and the address should be supplied, since it is known. So the receiving ward will see the address.

This is correct. However, as Russell points out, the clerk that is attempting to move the record to the other unit may be neglecting to input the address. It's an easy mistake for a clerk to make. Unless one knows better, if there is no change in address, it is reasonable to assume that there is no need to even go to the address section when moving a record.

As I suggested in this post, when you are moving a record to another unit, MLS should not assume (as it does now) that the address will be changing and blank it out.

At the end of the above mentioned post, I recommended:

danpass wrote: Add a check box control on panels where you are asked to enter contact information or addresses for a household or individual that lets you choose to preserve the existing data.

Upon further reflection, I believe the following would be even better...

Place 3 radio buttons on the address form displayed when moving a record. The labels for these buttons would be something like:

• New Address
• Keep Current Address
• New Address Unknown

MLS would not preselect a default. MLS should require the clerk to choose one before allowing him to finalize the request.

I provided step-by-step instructions to the clerk on how to move records out when the new unit and address is known. He had not been entering the new unit nor the member's address since he had never dealt with a move out in this manner. So now I think the records will be sent to the correct ward with no further problem.

Note: Having a copy of MLS available on my home computer with test data sure helps when trying to troubleshoot issues, or in this case provide step-by-step instructions. Before providing the instructions to the clerk he was certain he could only send the records to Salt Lake and not designate the new ward nor the address for the move.

Thanks for the support everyone!

RussellHltn wrote:That's why I said "if possible"

But that does bring up a good point. Just how is the record being sent? If the clerk is sending it to another ward and not supplying the address (because it's already correct) then the ward receiving it isn't going to see the address and of there's a good chance they are going to send it back.

To me, one of the cardinal rules of being a membership clerk is that you never send a record to another unit without an address.

JTaber wrote:To me, one of the cardinal rules of being a membership clerk is that you never send a record to another unit without an address.

While that's a good rule to follow generally, I would say if the person moved 6 months ago and you still don't have the forwarding address (and you also don't have a reasonable way of contacting the members), then you should move it out of your ward and let CHQ seek them out, which goes to Address Unknown world. If you do know the unit at least, I would say that's better than sending it to Address Unknown.

But I do agree with you that if you have the means to contact the member and it's been under 6 months or so since they moved out, I would keep it in your ward while you try to find out the forwarding address.

danpass wrote:This is correct. However, as Russell points out, the clerk that is attempting to move the record to the other unit may be neglecting to input the address. It's an easy mistake for a clerk to make. Unless one knows better, if there is no change in address, it is reasonable to assume that there is no need to even go to the address section when moving a record.

As I suggested in this post, when you are moving a record to another unit, MLS should not assume (as it does now) that the address will be changing and blank it out.

At the end of the above mentioned post, I recommended:


Upon further reflection, I believe the following would be even better...

Place 3 radio buttons on the address form displayed when moving a record. The labels for these buttons would be something like:

• New Address
• Keep Current Address
• New Address Unknown

MLS would not preselect a default. MLS should require the clerk to choose one before allowing him to finalize the request.

To add into this for Singles\students wards when they have members moving back to their home ward add in "Move back to last unit" with their old address as most of the time they are moving back to their home ward.

Also with most everyone having cell phones add in an option to keep phone # and e-mail address, as when a new ward receives their rec's they have some way of contacting them, or something to go off of