Welcome! This forum has a treasure trove of great info – Scouters helping Scouters! Just a heads up, though - all content, information, and opinions shared on this forum are those of the author, not the BSA.
While our unit pin is set with our meeting location and the “Location” button properly shows the spot when setting the unit pin as a key 3 member, and while our unit description has the right meeting place address, the data is not used in the search functions!
When searching for Pack 1882 in zip code 77479, we’re shown as “4.2 miles away” which is actually our chartered organization. That’s confirmed by switching from list view to map view. People in our zip code looking for a pack see us waaaay down in the list if using list view, and people who don’t live near us (but near our CO) find us in map view and want to join. Hence it’s not only not useful, it’s problematic!
Hopefully an option can be set to use the meeting location info that they have us enter, rather than the CO location. Else we won’t point people to use beascout.org, and instead will have to socialize a proprietary method which doesn’t help scouting as a whole.
I see this is still an issue, my Pack suffers from this as well. We are Pack 643 and show as far away as a unit in another zip code. Yet, two others say they are closer yet we are the only unit in zip code 60504. This really needs to be addressed… don’t use Charter Org address, use the PIN address.
Ownership and marketing are two different things. If you thought all Home Depot’s were in Atlanta, Georgia, that wouldn’t be helpful… I think this is a common issue, your Units epicenter isn’t the Chartering Org.
@JeremyGinsberg - what is the address listed on the recharter ? I suspect it is the charter organization. I get what you are stating but unless and until the BSA gets itself out of the charter org mode I am not sure this will, change.
The Charter Org - 3000 Liberty St, Aurora, IL 60502
The Unit Pin - 460 Inverness Drive, Aurora IL 60504
It’s clear that the search function uses the Charter Org address and not the Unit Pin. It is interesting, however, that the distance value seems to use the Unit Pin.
The short to this is that if you have a Unit Pin address established, the map and search should default to this. Your Charter Org is not always your meeting place nor its physical location may not even be in your service area. Long overdue enhancement is needed here.
My Unit Pin is a different zip code than my Charter Org. When I search in beascout, and enter the zip code of my Unit Pin, my unit is listed first (0.9 miles away). When you enter the zip code of you meeting place in beascout, where is your unit listed? far down on the list? past unit you know are farther away? but it calculates the distance using your Pin info?
There are also units that do not have US postal zip codes and government US postal zip codes that cover a large area of the world outside of the US states and territories,
BeAScout PIN data needs to include geographical location recordable by units and/or character organifzation. For marketing BSA® products BSA also needs to have geographical location of lone Cub Scouts and Scouts if possible.
The hardest case to handle might be Scouting on ships. Anyone for temporary units for Scouting on research or cruise ships? I do not know if their are large ships with crew families onboard.
@JonHanson I recommend that you ask your local council to submit a help ticket to National on your behalf. Please provide your local council with as much specific information as you can.
Our CC is trying to update the pin and contact details from her Myscouting account, she did click the “appear on Beascout” button and she did click save, notification said it would appear in 24-48 hours, but nothing change. Need help.
Also the US zip code was shown at the address, but we are in Asia west, is there any way to get rid of it? kindly advise.
