Financing a league

Handling the league finances is a very important duty for the fantasy commissioner. In order to run a legitimate fantasy league that awards prizes you have to:

• collect and secure the league dues,
• determine the prize levels and
• payout to winners at the end of the season. 

I've gone through a lot of changes with this process in my ten years as commissioner. This year is no exception as I will be trying a new on-line system. It's appropriately called LeagueSafe.

When I conducted off-line draft parties everyone attended bringing cash or check and I got all the money up front, for the most part. When I made the switch to an on-line draft it got a little bit trickier. No longer was I meeting everyone at the same time to collect dues. Instead I was meeting members at different times and, in some cases, making separate types of arrangements. For example, if I met a member at a sports bar it's conceivable for them to just want to pick up the check in exchange for paying the dues. It seemed reasonable. When you get down to it it's all relative, right?

In fact the biggest mistake you can make as a commissioner is to tie up the fantasy league finances with other things. When out with friends, who offer to pick up the bar tab in return for paying the dues, you should respectfully decline. It's a fine suggestion and they are probably just trying to make it easier for you but it won't work out well at the end of the season when you have to pay out to winners, especially with holiday shopping looming.

Here are my main suggestions when dealing with fantasy league finances.

• Keep league finances isolated.
• Don't involve any other deals you may have with your friends and other members in the league.
• Use an on-line system like PayPal or the new LeagueSafe.
• Collect the dues before members register their teams.
• Try to get it all done before the draft.
• Try to construct 1st, 2nd and 3rd place prize levels. 
• Make distribution of the winnings as simple as possible. 

I've used PayPal as my league's payment system the past two years. It's sufficient but, I feel, not all that user friendly. For example, members have had issues setting up an account and getting it to accept check cards. It's not that aesthetically appealing either. Then there's the fees. If you use it to both collect and payout then you're hit with the 2.9% fee twice in addition to another 30 cent fee each way as well. There also may be a withdrawal fee. And if a member pays via credit card without setting up an account then distributing winnings on-line is not possible for that member. This forces the commissioner to make the withdrawal themselves and either mail a personal check or deliver cash personally to pay that winner. Both can be very inconvenient and time consuming. The final word: PayPal is ok but I think one can do better. LeagueSafe, on the other hand, looks to be just right for fantasy football.

I'm going to use LeagueSafe for the first time this season. I've done some research and like what it offers.

• Convenience: you can pay with credit/check card or e-check.
• There are several simple options to distribute prizes to the winners.
• It's cheaper.
• It's easy to set up an account compared to PayPal.
• The site is designed for fantasy sports enthusiasts and it looks great.
• But most importantly, it's secure.

So far I've set up my league bank in LeagueSafe and made my own payment. Everything went ok. I contacted their customer service through email to ask a few more questions about security. They replied promptly and provided much detail about their Web security. LeagueSafe uses 128 bit encryption. They are tested and certified daily by McAfee. The site just went through a redesign phase and it looks very professional.

With the NFL lockout expected to end soon, I'm comfortable sending payment requests and getting members registered for the league. I'm excited to use LeagueSafe and feel that it will contribute legitimacy to my league, which is ten years old now and running-strong.