How to Apply

Please click here to download the GCA Membership Application Form

When complete please return to: Fax: 01727 896026 or Gasket Cutters’ Association, 105 St Peters Street, St Albans, Herts AL1 3EJ

Please email us at info@gcassociation.co.uk to receive Full Membership Pack

Membership Benefits

• Status, esteem and professional credibility offering reassurance to your customers and giving you a market “edge”.
• Membership Certificate to declare your status.
• Protection of a Code of Practice and associated disciplinary procedures.
• Inclusion in a Network of like-minded professionals offering mutual support, sharing business and commercial intelligence and assisting in business developments.
• Corporate membership of the British Standards Institution.
• Representation of your interests to government and other agencies.
• Regular newsletters – ‘Cutting Edge’ – keeping you abreast of association services and activities and offering you a channel of communication with the industry.
• Regular low-cost/high-quality meetings addressing your technical and commercial needs and interests.
• Access to opportunities for training and continuous professional development for all levels of staff.
• Opportunities to serve on the Executive Committee and to play a full part in the development of additional services and to represent the interests of your profession.
• Your company included on the GCA website, together with full contact details, company profile and link direct to your site.

  DON’T RISK BEING LEFT BEHIND … GET IN ON THE ACTION … JOIN TODAY WITHOUT DELAY

Membership Grades

The following grades of membership are offered:

• Member - Any company, the primary business of which is the cutting of gaskets from raw materials and which can demonstrate to the satisfaction of the Executive Committee that it is acting independently and without significant structural or legal links with another company, companies or sections thereof in a way which can call into question its recognition by the Executive Committee as a gasket cutter.
• Associate - Any company or a section of a company which, while being able to demonstrate a significant turnover derived from the cutting of gaskets from raw materials nevertheless fails to demonstrate to the satisfaction of the Executive Committee that it is acting independently and without any significant structural or legal links with another company, companies or sections thereof which are primarily recognised by the Executive Committee for other commercial activities and/or services.
• Affiliate - Any company, or section of a company which is not able to demonstrate a significant turnover derived from the cutting of gaskets from raw materials but which can, nevertheless, demonstrate to the Executive Committee that it has a commercial or professional interest in gaskets and is in a position to make a positive contribution to the aims and objectives of the Association.

Membership shall be corporate rather than personal. All employees of a company in membership will have access to and may benefit from services provided by the Association.

The Executive Committee will exercise full control over application and admission procedures. Their decision on all matters concerning applications and admissions will be final and they will not be bound to give any reason for any of their decisions on such matters.

Membership Fees

Code of Practice

1. As a Member of the Gasket Cutters’ Association (GCA), this company guarantees as follows:
2. That goods and services supplied by our business conform fully with current UK legislative and regulatory requirements;
3. That customer satisfaction and safety are of prime importance in all our dealings;
4. That our business maintains adequate levels of insurance cover appropriate to the nature, scale and scope of our business activities;
5. That all people employed or engaged by our company are adequately trained and supervised by competent management appropriate to their job functions and that we operate formal internal quality assurance systems covering all aspects of our business activities;
6. Goods and services are provided to client specifications and provide adequate and appropriate customer support and after sales service.
7. That we will accept full responsibility to the customer for the performance of anyone to whom work is sub-contracted;
8. That the member will uphold the good name and reputation of the GCA and its members and the industry in general. That members will offer the best advice to our customers on matters of specification with due regard to safety, whole life costs and the environment.
9. That in the event of any dispute between a customer and ourselves, which cannot be satisfactorily resolved through our own internal procedures, we
10. Agree to the appointment by GCA, on an equally shared cost basis with the customer, of an independent arbitrator by whose decision we will abide;
11. Client’s confidential information shall not be divulged to a third party and should not be used outside the immediate client - supplier relationship.
12. That we will abide by any decision of the Executive Committee of GCA, under the terms of their approved disciplinary procedures, following their consideration of any reported serious breach of this Code including a decision to suspend or terminate membership.

As amended/approved at the AGM 3/10/07

Why you should join the GCA

We are an Association of gasket cutters/converters and as such, we meet three times a year to exchange views and information with our colleagues, competitors and suppliers. If you are in the trade and not at these meetings you are not informed and not up to date with the latest news.

The meetings themselves comprise of a golf day, an AGM with a Ladies day at the races and a technical visit to suppliers or a large manufacturing concern. Many a good working relationship has been created at the “19th hole” or over the winner of the 3.30 @ Nottingham race course. All meetings are open to any of your staff not just managers/owners of companies. Site visits are a great way to let your staff see how other companies cope and deal with production and design.

There is a quarterly magazine; “The Cutting Edge” which includes articles on company developments and interesting staff profiles and much more.

What is the cost?

• For Affiliated and Associated - membership costs ₤585
• For Gasket Cutters/converters - membership costs ₤485

The GCA is a member of the British Standards Association, so that you don’t have to be. There’s a saving of over £200 per annum and you can have copies of any British Standard at half price. As a new member you will also be entitled to a free ½ page Advertisement in an issue of your choice of the Cutting Edge Newsletter.

For a gasket cutter, even without the saving from British Standards, the cost equates to 161 pints of Boddingtons (Manchester’s beer, brewed in Luton) – and for a 260 working day year that equates to 5/8th of a pint per day. (That’s just a little more than a litre if you are a lager drinker)

For Affiliated and Associated members we shall use the petrol rate of exchange = 97 gallons of petrol per annum, that’s 0.37 of a gallon a day; about 16 miles worth!

Quite obviously it is an expenditure that can be set off against profits.

So it’s not expensive to belong!

The GCA this year is investing heavily in a new web site and will develop it so that its members will be in a prominent position on the main search engines.

(Such promotion in turn improves the position of your own web site)

The site will have a “members only” area for surplus materials and bargain offers with a discussion of information forum. You have to be a member to see this.

The really nice thing about the GCA now in its 15th year, is that it is not a clique club, it is an association of like minded people who can forge relationships and trust with competitors and suppliers.