Samples of use
Diane's cocktail party...
Diane is personal assistant to the Secretary General of a EU business association. The Secretary General has just asked Diane to organise a cocktail reception. The boss wants to invite MEPs from the two committees that his association views as key for their interests - the Internal Market Committee and the Legal Affairs Committee.
No panic for Diane because she has just received her copy of e-Contacts EP. With this product installed in her MS Outlook, Diane is able to select both the full and substitute members of both committees and use the data to create a personalised letter to each one, inviting them to the reception. Once the letters have been printed off onto the association's letterhead, she also uses e-Contacts EP to generate labels for the envelopes.
John's trip to Strasbourg...
John is an experienced lobbyist working for a well-known Brussels consulting firm. He frequently makes trips to Strasbourg to call on MEPs with clients for issue briefing meetings. Before his trip, John has used his copy of e-Contacts EP to prepare a checklist of all the MEPs he has to meet over the two days with their office telephone numbers, their assistant's numbers, and, most important of all, their room number. No need to carry around the "Annuaire des Deputés", he has it all on a one-pager.
Maria's position paper...
Maria is the communications officer at an industry confederation in Brussels. The industry faces a major legislative initiative from the Commission. The confederation's position on the matter has been translated into French, German, Italian and Spanish and now needs to be sent to all the MEPs on the Parliament's Committee on Environment, Public Health and Food Safety.
With e-Contacts EP, Maria has the up-to-date listing at her finger tips. She chooses to send different language versions to different groups of MEPs according to nationality. This is easy with e-Contacts EP because she can select all the Italians in the Committee and send them the Italian version of the position paper, likewise with the Germans and the Spanish. In the end she decides to send the French text to the French, French-speaking Belgian and Luxembourg MEPs. All the others get the English version. This complex set of emails are prepared and sent out in a couple of hours.
Frieda's appeal to some Dutch and German members of Women's Rights Committee...
Frieda works for an NGO in the field of woman's rights. The Women's Rights and Gender Equality Committee is reviewing a proposal and earlier in the month she used her copy of e-Contacts EP to send an email to all the members of the Committee attaching a copy of her NGO's position on the proposal under consideration.
Next week the committee will vote but things don't look good as the German and Dutch members of the European People's Party are opposing some of the key objectives. Frieda quickly prepares a two paragraph message in German and Dutch. With the help of e-Contacts EP, she then prepares a group e-mail to the German and Dutch members of the EPP in the Women's Committee and sends it off. Then she prints out the telephone list for the same MEPs ready for a telephone blitz the following morning.
François' fax-letter to the Socialist Group...
François is head of public affairs for a major European multi-national company. François sees that his CEO has been misquoted in the press. This could negatively influence an important vote in the plenary of the European Parliament. He must communicate with the Socialists to correct the misunderstanding and again explain in simple terms the company's position before the vote in two days.
The most immediate way to do this will probably be by a fax that will arrive straight on the MEPs desks. Luckily, he has taken a multi-user license for e-Contacts EP and all three of his team have access to the data on the server. They split the task between them each taking charge of sending the fax to 6 or 8 nationalities in the Socialist group. With the help of e-Contacts EP a brief e-mail followed by a fax is on its way to every Socialist MEP within the hour.