We Hope To Have This Program Operational Again soon – Please Stay Tuned
When people are first introduced to Time Banking, they usually have a lot of questions about how it all works and what types of services and things they can exchange in a Time Bank.
Time exchanges have been around for over a 100 years, presumably much longer in various forms, many undocumented.
During the last two great depressions in the US, hundreds of thousands (possibly millions) of people organized to meet their basic needs when the mainstream economy and centralized monetary system failed them.
Unemployed poor folks got together to create time dollar stores, cooperative mills, farms, healthcare systems, foundries, repair and recycling facilities, distribution warehouses, health care systems, and a myriad of other service exchanges.
Many of these were based on the hour as a unit of account, and often everyone’s hour was equal and could either be exchanged for another hour of service or the equivalent in goods.
What can Time Banking do for me?
Time Banking does many things for different people. Here is a short list of some ways people have used Time Banking to achieve their goals
- Car rides (airport, doctors visits)
- Budget and tax preparation
- Yard work
- Child and pet care
- Shopping
- Minor home repair
- House painting
- Holistic therapy (massage, acupuncture)
- Organizing your home
- Interior design
- Mending and alterations
- Computer help
- Web design, garden work
- Moving assistance
- House sitting
- Cooking
- Cleaning
- Private lessons
- Classes and tutoring
- Editing
- Translating
- Companionship
- Neighborhood renewal
- Community safety
- Health improvement
- Mutual support for single parent families
- Peer self-help, especially young people
- Involving older people as active citizens
- Integrating people with physical and learning disabilities
- Respite for caregivers
- Intergenerational understanding
- Community colleges
- Residents participation
- Environmental clean ups
- Rehabilitation of substance abusers
If you like to volunteer and give time to your community, Time Banking is a way to get something back in exchange for your time. If you want to build a network of support within your neighborhood or community, Time Banking can help you do exactly that.
Instead of paying professionals to look after your children, care for your aging parents, and do the work that family and neighbors used to do for one another, the members of your Time Bank can do those things for each other. Time Banking creates connections through sharing skills.
If you are a social services professional and/or an individual committed to social change and social justice, Time Banking can help you involve the groups you are working with and give them a way to give back to each other and shape the outcome of their program.
Why should I care and what is so special about Time Banking?
Many people are looking up from their busy lives and wondering if something essential hasn’t gone missing. Is the nuclear family enough to feel fully alive? Some of us can remember a time when family members lived close by each other and we knew most of the people living in our neighborhoods.
Some of us have only heard about it. Helping each other out was a given, something we did for each other every day. From watching someone’s kids for a few hours, dropping off meals for a sickly neighbor to potluck suppers and barn raisings, communities were full of exchanges and mutually supportive networks of family and friends.
Few people would disagree that times have changed, that these networks are gradually disappearing and few of us have family members nearby or neighbors we know well enough to turn to for support. There are so many things we do that would be more efficient, fun, and meaningful when shared.
What services can I buy with Time Dollars and what can I do to earn Time Dollars?
The list of possibilities is endless. From walking a neighbor’s dog, oiling a squeaky door, raking leaves, stuffing envelopes, braiding hair, cooking meals, giving music lessons, running errands to lending professional advice, everyone in a Time Bank has a valuable skill to share.
What if I don’t have time for volunteering? Isn’t this just one more thing that’s going to eat up my extra time?
Not unless you want to give extra time! Many of the services people exchange in a Time Bank are the types of things they are already doing every day. For example, those of us who have children are already cooking for them, driving them to activities, and helping them with their schoolwork—among other things.
Cooking an extra portion of food for someone down the street who is housebound, picking up your neighbor’s kids on the way to soccer practice, or helping the child down the street with his homework don’t add work to your day. Or, if you have a dog and take it for a walk every day, why not pick up your neighbor’s dog along the way?
For professionals like doctors, lawyers and business people, Time Banking is a way to give back to your community without having to go someplace else on someone else’s schedule. For example, you can just set aside 10% of your appointment calendar for Time Bank members.
Even better, Time Banking helps you gain extra time because down the road, you can spend the Time Dollars you’ve earned and have someone else do something for you that you can’t fit into your schedule or simply don’t know how to do!
How exactly does it work?
When you work for an hour to do something for an individual or group, you earn a Time Dollar. Then you can use that Time Dollar to buy an hour of a neighbor’s time, engage in a group activity offered by a neighbor or buy something that has been donated to the Time Bank Store.
Why is everyone’s time given the same value?
At first glance, it seems crazy that someone is paid the same for web design and pulling weeds, but this turns out to be the core of what makes Time Dollars really work. In the “Yin” or “caring economy” everyone’s time is valued equally – just like it is inside a family.
You wouldn’t ask your cousin to give you two hours of dog walking for every hour you spend fixing his computer. Putting a price on people’s time separates us by making some people more valuable than others. Time Dollars excel in building relationships because they place an equal value on everyone’s time.
Time Dollars aren’t meant to replace standard dollars. They are designed to counterbalance the market economy where people may have invested in special training to make their time more valuable.
There’s nothing wrong with that, in fact we encourage it, but we feel it’s just taken over too much of our experience of the world. Almost everything is monetized. What we are trying to do is build a parallel economy where people take care of each other as families. We are building extended families by geography, not bloodlines.
Isn’t Time Banking like bartering?
It is, but the big difference is that you don’t have to pay back the person who does you a favor. It is a “pay-it-forward” system. That’s one of the reasons why people find it so much easier to do things for others in a Time Banking system. You don’t have to figure out what to give back to the person who helped you. You can choose how to pay it forward doing what you want, when you want, with skills you are good at and enjoy doing.
Can you exchange your Time Dollars for cash or goods with other members?
The Silver City Gospel Mission Time Bank does not allow direct transactions, because of the ever-present temptation to make an equivalency between Time Dollar value and regular dollar value in an exchange of goods for services. This type of transaction is taxable.
But we do allow you to use your time dollars in our Time Dollar Store where all goods have been freely given and donated.
Who runs the Time Bank?
This time bank is run by the staff and volunteers at the Silver City Gospel Mission. If you would like to volunteer your time (and earn time dollars for other uses), please check that you want to volunteer at the time bank on your skills/offers when you sign join.
How do people connect to each other?
People either connect to each other online via our Time Banks Community Weaver web software or through the Gospel Mission Coordinator.
How do you keep track of the exchanges?
All you have to do is record the exchange and the number of hours, and it will be credited to your account online.
What kinds of people join Time Banks?
Everyone can join a Time Bank and all kinds of people do.
Can social service agencies and non-profits use Time Banking to deliver services for less?
Certainly they can, and many agencies have found that Time Banking does help them reduce costs because their clients become active participants and service providers for one another. But, even more importantly, the reciprocity that is naturally built into every Time Bank helps clients to become more engaged in directing and creating positive outcomes for themselves and all the members of the program.
If you currently charge your clients a flat or fixed fee, perhaps you can use time dollars for part or all of the fee and then use your time dollars in the time bank for something else.
This sense of ownership and empowerment is often of far greater value to an agency than delivering services at a lower cost because their clients are creating their own path toward meeting the program’s goals.
Can I trust the people in a Time Bank to come into my home?
Our Time Bank requires that all participants provide two references, and we also require that individuals allow us to do a basic background check and a more detailed check for certain skills like driving, babysitting, house sitting or house cleaning. (Member Screening Policies)
However, our Time Bank does not do detailed background searches on all applicants. We encourage all participants to use common sense and safety measures to protect their person and personal property.
For instance, ask for and check references, do not allow unknown persons into your home without having another friend or family member present, search online for information regarding a person offering professional services, and interview/meet with a trading partner in advance of the trade.
For individuals who are offering services like driving, house sitting or child care, we require that you provide to the Gospel Mission a full background check that we keep on file and make available to your trading partners.
What if someone falsely bills me?
Time Banks are built on mutual respect and trust and this type of thing is very rare. If you think that that someone has falsely billed you for services, all you have to do is call your Coordinator who will straighten things out.
Can people cheat?
Whenever one person earns Time Dollars, there is a corresponding debit for the same amount in someone else’s account. This makes it pretty easy to know if someone is cheating or not. No one is anonymous in a Time Bank, so people don’t cheat.
What happens if you go into debt?
Having a negative balance is not a big deal in a Time Dollar account. After all, people have to receive in order for others to give. We ask that individuals not go farther then 10-20 Time Dollars into debt, however this is flexible and situation dependent.
People who have a history of earning lots of Time Dollars are generally allowed a bigger debt limit. Generally, not much will happen other than a call from your Coordinator to remind you that you will need to earn some Time Dollars before you can start spending them again.
And, for members in need, many time banks have a special Time Dollar fund contributed by individual members that are set aside for community projects or to help out members who are going through a difficult period.
Are my transactions taxable?
No. The IRS has ruled that Time Banks are not commercial barter exchanges and create no contractual rights. We do allow you to use your time dollars in the time dollar store, but all goods in this store have been freely donated.
What about liability?
As part of the on-line registration process members must read and agree to the Terms and Conditions of time banking. One of these conditions is that the Silver City Gospel Mission Time Bank “shall have neither liability nor responsibility to any person or entity with respect to loss, damage, or injury caused or alleged to be caused directly or indirectly by information contained on this web site or any other Time Bank resources”.
TIME BANKING RESOURCES on the WEB
Timebanks USA: http://timebanks.org/
Timebanks UK: http://www.timebanking.org/
Time For the World: http://blog.timeftw.org/
hOUR World: http://www.hourworld.org/
OpenSource Currency: http://www.opensourcecurrency.org/
Shareable: http://www.shareable.net/
TimeDollar Youth Court: http://youthcourtofdc.org/
A Start Up Document by Tony Budak, Timebank Mahoning:
http://timebankswork.net/tiki/tiki-index.php?page=Tony%27s+Quick+Startup+Guide
Resilience Circles: http://localcircles.org/what-is-a-resilience-circle/
New Economics Institute: http://neweconomicsinstitute.org/
Slow Money: http://slowmoney.org/
Business Alliance for Local Living Economies: http://bealocalist.org/
Charles Eisenstein: http://sacred-economics.com, www.charleseisenstein.net
Complementary Currency Resource Center: http://www.complementarycurrency.org/
The Sustaninable Economics Law Center: http://www.theselc.org/
Neighborgoods: http://neighborgoods.net/
Catalyst Network of Communities: http://www.gocatalyst.org/