Clarification Only: Proposal: currency rate consistency fix

[Bradley M. Kuhn]

Andrew,

I've responded below in detail to your points, but I really do think that
the change I proposed just yields consistency with the existing 2014-06-11
change (which is in combination with the later change on 2017-08-24).  The
policy is quoted as '>>' below, and that's been in the text since 2014.

BTW, if folks do think my patch constitutes an actual policy change from the
2014-06-11 and 2017-08-24 updates, rather than mere clarification in the
summary section (which was my intent), please do propose an alternative
patch to yield a better clarification.  That's why I brought it up here.

(From what I can tell, we just forgot to update the summary section the last
two times (2014, 2017) we updated the main body of the policy on the issue
of currencies, and my patch simply puts all back in sync.  I apologize in
advance if I'm missing something on that.)

Response below on Andrew's substantive points (which are commentary
primarily on this 2014-06-11 change:

>> #### Currency Conversion Charges Part of Per Diem

>> Any fees associated with currency conversion are not reimbursable as an
>> expense separate from the allocated per diem.

Andrew Bartlett wrote at 14:45 (PDT) on Monday:
> I would note that this means the concervancy won't pay the FX fee hidden
> in the margin on the credit card conversion rate.

I wouldn't characterize it as "Conservancy won't pay".  Conservancy *does*
have a method to pay for them, via the M&IE Per Diem (from USA Dept of State
rates, per the policy).  Those are quite generous.  Pick your favorite city
and search https://aoprals.state.gov/web920/per_diem.asp to see.

We considered this explicitly when we drafted the 2014-06-11 change.  In our
experience, both as (staff) travelers ourselves [0] and in processing member
project requests, we had seen that the M&IE was more than adequate to cover
daily expenses for food (etc.) *as well as* currency conversion costs.
Also, the added benefit is the travelers no longer need to send us detailed
receipts in both currencies (i.e., from the CC company) showing the exchange
charges.

Meanwhile, has anyone actually seen a scenario where the fees were so high
that including them in M&IE per diem caused their travel costs to go higher
than the per diem allotment?

In our experience, usually member project travelers have sought little or no
M&IE per diem, even under this policy that we've had since 2014.  So, our
experience doesn't show it as costing Conservancy more to do it this way.
It also saves in staff time, as we don't need to pouring over currency
conversion receipts.

> This actually just gives the incentive to use the expensive 'dynamic
> currency conversion' thing on offer by many businesses and hotels (which
> gives an even worse rate) as that will give you an invoice in your home
> currency.

I've yet to see anyone to do that, and since this has been the policy since
June 2014, we'd have probably seen it by now if someone was going to try it.

Frankly, our biggest problem is that travelers don't read the travel policy
at all before traveling, so I'd be pretty surprised if someone read it
closely enough to even think about this issue at the time of purchase.

> So, be careful what you wish for here.

What I wish for is to make sure travelers get all their reasonable travel
expenses reimbursed, while minimizing the burden on them of collecting
documentation and the overhead of us processing it [1].  This change we made
in 2014 was designed to do that, and I *think* it's working, but patches are
welcome (that's what this list is for) if you can propose a better way.


[0] I want to draw particular attention to that point.  Conservancy's staff
    follows this travel policy ourselves for all our travel, and all policy
    changes are approved by the Board of Directors.  I have traveled
    frequently since 2014 under this policy and I find it quite generous.

[1] I should take a moment to note that we have other constraints, namely,
    IRS rules for charities and the like.  A great example is this dead pull
    request:
      https://k.sfconservancy.org/policies/pull-request/4/_/five-hundred-dollar-receipt-limit

    which was going to make all our lives a lot easier (since ~ 75% of all
    Conservancy travel reimbursement requests are <= US$500), but our
    auditors nixed the idea when we ran it by them for feedback before
    implementing it. :(
-- 
Bradley M. Kuhn
Distinguished Technologist of Software Freedom Conservancy
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