proposal for the travel policy - no receipts for <= $500

[Stormy Peters]

Is all the travel project specific? If so, can we have the projects review
and approve?

Stormy

On Tue, Jul 19, 2016 at 7:57 PM, Karen Sandler <karen at sfconservancy.org>
wrote:

> As many of you know, the travel policy has caused a tremendous amount of
> work
> for Conservancy, where we have to track all of the appropriate records to
> demonstrate that the policy was followed.  Our policy is designed to make
> sure that no funds are inappropriately used or wasted to ensure maximum
> benefit to our charitable mission, while allowing as much flexibility as we
> can to travelers (for example, travelers can pick their own airlines and
> times provided that they save a search showing that the fare is
> reasonable).
>
> Over the number of years, we've found that this doesn't always work out
> well.
> Many travelers, particularly those new to the policy or who only travel
> once
> on behalf of the project,  don't read the rules and leave Conservancy
> without
> adequate documentation.  Further, the goal of keeping the spending to
> reasonable amounts gets lost for smaller trips. We also find that we're
> spending more and more staff time scrutinizing smaller travel. After a lot
> of thought, we've decided the documentation we currently require for
> smaller
> reimbursement amounts may not be necessary for what we want to accomplish.
> We still think that the policy as it stands does a good job when the
> expenses are higher.
>
> We'd like to propose a blanket exception on receipts for anything $500 or
> less, so long as we get attestations by both the PLC and the traveler that
> they have indeed followed the policy. The rules would still apply, and we'd
> still require a report on what was accomplished during the event. PLCs, if
> they'd like more documentation before they provide their attestation, can
> require receipts if they want, but they'd be responsible for evaluating and
> organizing them.  I think this is a sensible limit for all of our projects.
>
> Of course this is subject to our board as well as our outside auditor's
> approval.
>
> The relevant excerpt is below and you can review it in context at
>
>
> https://k.sfconservancy.org/policies/pull-request/4/_/five-hundred-dollar-receipt-limit
>
> karen
>
> -------------
>
> For any travel reimbursement requests that are $500 or less for all
> expenses related to a single trip, no receipts or fare search are required
> to be provided with the reimbursement report, provided that:
>
> * the traveler attests that all expenses are bonafide and within the
> travel policy requirements, includes their aforementioned trip
> report and indicates the dates of travel, and
>
> * the PLC attests that to the best of its knowledge, the expenses
> were appropriately incurred and within the travel policy, that
> the travel did in fact occur.
>
> PLCs may at their discretion impose any additional documentation required
> for PLC approval.
>
>
>
> Karen M. Sandler
> Executive Director, Software Freedom Conservancy
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>
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