Twin Cities Quality Assurance Association (TCQAA)

Located in the metropolitan area of Minneapolis and St. Paul, Minnesota,
TCQAA has been supporting software organizations and information technology professionals since 1986.
TCQAA's vision is to disseminate and promote quality assurance concepts, principles and practices in information technology across all industries.

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Membership Policies and Information

Last Updated: February 12, 2007

Contents:
Membership Entrance Requirements
Membership Year
Membership TYPEs
                  -- Individual
                  -- Corporate
Membership Dues
Membership Cards? versus Name Badge Cards
Membership List and Distribution of List
                  -- Notes on Contact Information

Further Information:
See list of     Corporate Memberships    You may already be a member!
Read the   Membership Application Forms
Contact the   Membership Committee

Entrance Requirements

Membership in the Association is open to all individuals and organizations interested and/or involved in software quality assurance and/or software quality control.

Membership helps support this local organization.
Individuals outside practical commuting distances to our meetings are encouraged to locate local quality organizations.
Use our links to help find information on national and international opportunities.

Membership Year

TCQAA memberships are for one calendar year, beginning January 1 and expiring December 31.

TCQAA allows for open enrollment throughout the year and memberships can be purchased at any time.
However, all TCQAA memberships will expire in December of the year for which purchased.
The only exception is for new and returning lapsed memberships paid during the months of October, November, or December. Memberships paid during these months will not expire until December of the following year.

Also, TCQAA does not prorate dues for "half-year" memberships. If the only use for the Membership is to attend the monthly meetings (and money is an issue), prospective Members are advised that, for them, it may be more agreeable to pay the visitor's fee at the meetings and then buy the membership after September.

Prior to 2000, the membership year started October 1 and ended September 30 of the next calendar year.

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Membership TYPEs

TCQAA has two basic types of Memberships: Individual and Corporate.
Internally, TCQAA also uses "Service" and "PSQT" to designate special-use variations of the Individual TYPE.

Individual Membership

This membership is purchased for one person. The person is an Individual Member and has full voting privileges.

Speakers at TCQAA monthly presentation meetings will be given Individual Membership for “Service” for the year in which they present and for the following year, and only if the speaker wants the TCQAA Membership.

The TCQAA Board annually votes Individual Membership for “Service” to Active Members who have volunteered their time to make TCQAA possible.

Corporate Membership

This membership is purchased by a company, or any part of a company, for the company's employees. Each employee, that the Company includes under its Corporate Membership, is considered a "Member under a Corporate Membership".
The following restrictions and requirements apply to Corporate Memberships:

The maximum number of Members under a single Corporate Membership is unlimited.
(Note: the previous policy of allowing only 40 Members under a Corporate Membership has been changed to encourage more participation by Corporate members.)
Only six Members under a Corporate Membership have full voting privileges.
All other benefits and privileges are available to all Members.
There is no restriction on work location for any of the Members under a Corporate Membership. Every such Member is expected to be an employee of the Company with the Corporate Membership, either a direct permanent employee or a full-time contractor. If a Company wishes to extend Membership to a contractor under the Company's Corporate Membership, the Company may do so.
Every Member under a Corporate Membership shall have a valid email address, either work or home, on record in the Membership Database. TCQAA will record any other contact information supplied for the Member. But the valid email address is required to validate that the person actually exists. TCQAA reserves the right to change a Member’s Status to “Canceled” when it is discovered that the Member no longer has at least one valid email address on record. An exception to this will be granted to Companies that do not provide email accounts to their employees that want to be Members of TCQAA.
Every Corporate Membership shall have a Contact Person to coordinate the membership with TCQAA, interface with the TCQAA officers when necessary, and to disseminate information to the Members under that Corporate Membership.
The Corporate Membership may list a Secondary Contact Person to be contacted when the Contact Person cannot be reached.
For purposes of invoicing by TCQAA to the Company, the Corporate Membership may have a Bill-To person with an address different from or the same as the address of the Corporate Membership, which is expected to be the work address of at least the Contact Person.

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Membership Dues

Annual dues are payable in December.

Individual membership - $35.00 per year
Corporate membership - $200.00 per year

Membership Cards? What Membership Cards?

Currently, TCQAA does NOT issue Membership Cards. TCQAA has never had Membership Cards.
Information stating otherwise on the previous version of this page was erroneous.

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Name Badge Cards

TCQAA does have Name Badge Cards which are handed out at the monthly meetings for permanent ownership by the Member.

One main purpose of the Name Badge Card is to take attendance at these monthly meetings.
It has a barcode for quick and accurate Member identification to speed meeting registration.

The other main purpose of the Name Badge Card is to serve as the Member's name tag during the meeting.

Only rarely and for special reasons (such as the Member lives near Washington, D.C) does TCQAA mail the Name Badge Card to the Member.

Membership List and Distribution of the List, which is also known as Directories

To promote networking, all members will receive the complete membership list, including contact information.

Members who wish NOT to have their name and address information published, may indicate their desire on the application or renewal forms, and by sending an email to the Membership Committee. Written requests for changes and exclusions will be honored the next time the membership list is published.

Notes on Contact Information

TCQAA no longer takes Fax phone numbers as part of a Member’s contact information.

The Members Directory sorted by Company does not contain contact information. It just lists Members with their job titles.

The contact information in the Members Directory sorted by Name is only the work address, work phone, and work email. Where the work information is blank, it is NOT replaced by any available corresponding home information.

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