All about the conference; registration and fees

Index:

About the Conference
Registration
Conference Fees
Fees in summary.
Additional vouchers: The UK Conference Package

About the Conference

The GSE UK Region Conference is an annual event which takes place in November for two and a half days, generally in the Midlands. This annual event is organised by the GSE Conference Committee who are all volunteers.

There are several keynote and plenary sessions and a large number of subject streams, each of which covers a specific area of interest. The majority of the streams are aligned to one of the regular working groups and the agenda for the stream is coordinated by the committee of that working group. In addition, there are several non-working group aligned streams and workshops organised by the central conference committee which also coordinates the overall conference agenda.

Where possible ideas and suggestions from participants attending the previous conference are used to form the agenda for the following year’s event. Topics may also be received from the various GSE Working Groups or may be based on announcements from IBM and other vendors.

The conference provides more than 100 hours of technical training from IBM, other vendors and most importantly from GSE members themselves.  Plenty of time is set aside to allow for networking with speakers, vendors and delegates during breaks and the evening receptions and dinners.

Each year there is a large conference exhibition with stands from many companies who build and sell solutions relevant to the membership.  The income from this exhibition and associated sponsorship enables GSE to offer six free places plus one trainee place per member company.  It also allows GSE to charge very reasonable rates to other delegates attending the conference.

GSE works with educational establishments to encourage students to attend, as everyone is acutely aware of the increasing skills shortage in the mainframe industry. Students are offered free places, a number of which include free accommodation. The conference includes a whole stream dedicated to people new to the platform. More information on this offer can be found here.

The 2017 national conference attracted 479 delegates.  There were 3 keynote sessions and 15 streams comprising 150 sessions of technical education.

Registration

Please note that ALL people attending the conference venue in any capacity need to register in order to have a badge.

Please register using the "Registration" menu link above.

Conference Fees

The basic conference fees have been unchanged for four years.  Our costs have not.  Consequently we have had to increase our prices for 2018. Therefore the VAT inclusive fees are now as follows:-

Delegates from GSE member companies (see below)              £150 per day
Delegates from other non-member companies                          £240 per day

There is a 20% discount (inc. VAT) to this rate for registrations made during the early bird period (up to and including October 8th) and there will be a £30 admin surcharge (inc. VAT) for late registrations made after the Friday before the conference (November 2nd).

Each UK GSE member company is entitled to send up to six delegates and one bone fide trainee FREE OF CHARGE provided they register during the early bird period. Additional delegates will be charged at the prevailing member rate. Voucher codes are issued to each member company for this purpose.

After the end of the early bird period vouchers issued to GSE member companies may still be used up to one week prior to the conference (Sunday October 28th) however they will be charged at HALF the relevant rate, i.e. £75 per day inc. VAT. Vouchers that have been purchased as a conference package can be redeemed free of charge at any time up to the Friday 2nd November after which a late fee of £30 will be charged.

Fees in summary.

The following table shows the fees per day including VAT at 20% for each category of delegate and date range

Delegates from ;-	Prior to 09/10/18	From 09/10/18     to 28/10/18	From 29/10/18 to 2/11/18	After 2/11/18
UK GSE Members (up to 6 plus 1 trainee) or others with vouchers provided with your company membership	Free	£75	£150	£180
UK GSE Members  (additional) and non-UK GSE members	£120	£150	£150	£180
Non Members	£192	£240	£240	£270
Vouchers bought as part of a conference package	Free	Free	Free	£30

Additional vouchers: The UK Conference Package

The GSE UK Conference Package enables companies, be they members or non-members of GSE, to purchase discounted "bulk" attendance to the annual UK Conference.

• The Conference Package is available to any company, be they member or non-member, and offers benefits in addition to any benefits they obtain through being GSE members or conference sponsors/exhibitors.
• The Conference Package offers three voucher codes, each of which can be used to register at no charge for the two and a half days of the conference up to a week before the conference (October 29th).
• Voucher codes have no monetary value and unused voucher codes cannot be reimbursed or exchanged (but may be offered free of charge to a client or customer).
• For non-members the Package also allows additional conference registrations at the members' rate plus the ability to attend other UK working group meetings during the period of validity.
• The Conference Package can only be purchased during the early bird period and is valid for the UK conference in the year in which it is purchased and for working group meetings during the following 12 months.
• The cost of the Conference Package is £650 plus VAT (£780) for GSE members and £1,000 plus VAT (£1,200) for non-members.
• Companies are able to purchase multiple Conference Packages should they so wish.
• Requests to purchase the UK Conference Package should be sent by e-mail to ukconference@gse.org.uk.