General Guidelines

Stewardship Responsibility

As noted in the policy linked above, field staff are expected to employ sound judgment and prudent financial management in their stewardship of Reliant resources. As such, field staff share the responsibility of ensuring that Reliant resources are used appropriately; support the ministry; comply with Reliant policies, applicable laws, regulations, and donor restrictions; and consider the reputation of the ministry. Excessive and unnecessary expenditures must be avoided, and Reliant may, in its sole discretion, decline to reimburse excessive expenses.  Our stewardship responsibility also means that field staff may not use, or attempt to use, Reliant's non-profit status for personal benefit (e.g. avoiding state sales tax on personal or ministry items). 

General Criteria for Determining A Permissible Expense

As noted in the policy linked above, the general criteria for determining whether an expense qualifies for reimbursement are that the expense must be

• Reasonable in that the expense is not extreme or excessive, and it reflects the amount that would normally be spent in that specific situation;
• Ordinary in that one would normally expect this kind of expense to occur when performing ministry work;
• Necessary to achieve a valid ministry objective fulfilling the mission of Reliant;
• Directly related to the job/ministry of the field staff; and
• Sufficiently documented and timely submitted

 *Reliant reserves the right to determine whether or not an expense fulfills the above criteria. 

Submission Request Types

Submission for payment of a ministry expense may be done through the following four types:

• Submission of expenses that qualify under IRS guidance as non-taxable reimbursed business expenses is referred to as a “Reimbursement.” Please note that, although Reliant Reimbursements are processed in such a way that they are not included in the employee's taxable income, the employee bears ultimate responsibility for her/his income tax return(s), including the proper tax treatment of all payments received from Reliant and should consult with her/his tax adviser as needed to determine the appropriate reporting and treatment of such payments.
• Submissions requesting recovery of expenses that do not qualify for non-taxable reimbursement under the IRS guidance are referred to as “Expense Recovery Bonus”or ERB. ERB payments take the form of a bonus which will be treated as additional taxable wages (compensation) for the field staff. Due to the fact that only paid employees can receive a taxable bonus, associates are not eligible to submit a request for an ERB.
• Field staff may request advance payment for anticipated reimbursable expenses through an "Expense Advance." Advances are not guaranteed but will be considered on a case-by-case basis.
• For expenses related to a ministry project fund, field staff also have the option of requesting payment through a "Grant" rather than a Reimbursement. Grants are also used for the expense of an item that the ministry project will retain ownership of beyond its initial use. (See Reimbursements vs. Grants for more details)

Relevant Forms

All submissions for expense Reimbursements and ERBs should use the appropriate form listed below. Please use the direct form links provided by Reliant to open a brand new form for each month's expense submission rather than copying a form that has already been submitted for a previous expense, in order to capture form updates and formatting changes that occur based on information written on the form.  

• Current approved Expense Submission Request Forms are required for expense submission.
  • U.S.  Expense Submission Form
  • International Expense Submission Form
  • Continuing Education Form
• Expense advances, primarily relating to large, expected travel expenditures, will be considered on a case-by-case basis.
• Exception requests are available for submission in the event of a denied Reimbursement or a late submission. 
• Add link to grant form here (See Standard for Project Funds and Grant Making for detailed guidance)

Included on the form with each expense should be:

1. 1. Itemized original receipts and all other appropriate substantiating documents must be received by Reliant central within 60 days after the end of the month in which the expense occurs, is incurred or is paid by the employee. (See receipt guidelines below for more details.) 
   2. Employees must provide a written explanation for each expense submitted clearly documenting:

      • Description of the expense

      • Whom the item is for:
        • First and last names of the people involved
        • The ministry relationship of the person(s) to the field staff. If expense relates to five or more people, list them as a group with the specific number in the group (e.g. 12 ministry partners). Actual names are not necessary for groups of five or more people. Otherwise, use of actual first and last names is required, if the relationship is not uniform.

1. 1. • Specific ministry purpose of the expense (be as detailed as possible). For more secure locations, please see Secure Lexicon for more details. 
      • Cost of the item (the portion of the cost that is ministry related if not 100%)
      • Date of the expense (a new Reimbursement form is needed for each month you incurred an expense) 

*Please refer to all Reimbursement Standards below, which detail receipt information and other specific criteria.

Submission Timeframe

For all Reimbursements and Expense Recovery Bonuses, requests must be received within 60 days after the end of the month in which the expense is incurred. An expense is incurred when an item is purchased or in the case of pre-payment for travel the expense can be incurred when the travel has actually taken place as long as both the payment date and travel date are listed on the receipt for documentation. 

Late submissions will be considered on a case-by-case basis by the submission of an exception request. The exception request must include a valid reason for the late submission and include supervisor approval.

Please review the table below for more details on the timing of receiving Reimbursement/bonus funds based on the submission date. 

Payment Dates

Order of Pay

Reliant will pay approved Reimbursements and Expense Recovery Bonuses following the Order of Pay, which includes: 

1. Expense Recovery Bonus
2. Back Pay (if applicable), including back pay accrued by either spouse, if married. Back Pay includes previously submitted Expense Recovery Bonuses waiting for funding as long as the bonus remains eligible for Back Pay (See Back Pay for Bonus below for more detail)
3. Back Reimbursements (formerly known as cabinet expenses) are unpaid Reimbursements waiting for funding and paid in the order they were received as long as the Back Reimbursements remain eligible for Reimbursement (See Back Reimbursements below for more detail)
4. Reimbursements are paid in the order they are received

Sufficient Funds Required

How funds come out of the different funds

For all types of expense submissions, sufficient funds are required no matter the fund that is being used to pay the expenses submitted. 

In general, expense submissions are paid out of the MTD fund for which the field staff is responsible for 

Project Funds are paid out of the project fund 

Back Reimbursement 

Reimbursements: If the MTD account for which a field staff is responsible does not contain sufficient funds to provide full reimbursement for the amount requested by the field staff on an expense submission request form, Reliant will hold the form and delay reimbursement storing the expense submission as a "back reimbursement" until sufficient funds are available in the staff MTD account, in accordance with Reliant's approved order of pay.  Back reimbursements will be paid out in the order from which the reimbursement submissions were received once funds become available for the whole amount of each individual reimbursement. 

Reliant will not automatically partially pay a back reimbursement. You may request that we reduce the back reimbursement for a partial payment or completely remove it from the queue, but they will then not be eligible to be reinstated should funding become available later. Unpaid back reimbursements will be retained by Reliant for the calendar year in which the expenses were incurred, plus two (2) additional calendar years.

Back reimbursements are stored until enough funding can be raised through the end of December two years after the expenses were submitted before they expire. After January 31st of that next year, when all expense reimbursements have been completely processed and paid by Reliant, any un-reimbursed back reimbursement expenses from December 31st of the prior year will be marked as expired and can no longer be paid. Example: expenses submitted in 2019 are eligible for payment as a back reimbursement until January 31, 2022, if you raised sufficient funds by December 31, 2021.

Back Pay for Bonus

Expense Recovery Bonus: If funds are not available to immediately recuperate all of the Expense Recovery Bonuses (ERB) (previously known as taxable reimbursements) that were submitted, then Reliant will short-check those bonuses and include them with backpay, in accordance with Reliant's approved order of pay. In the order of pay, Expense Recovery Bonuses take precedence over Reimbursements, in accordance with IRS requirements.  As a reminder, Reliant will generally compensate employees for back pay which has been acquired within the current year and the past two years before it is expired, subject to an employee fulfilling his or her obligation to raise the required amount of support for Reliant. 

Requesting a Reimbursement be Partially Paid Out (forfeiting any un-reimbursed expenses)

If a field staff would like to request a reimbursement be partially paid out using the available funds, they must agree to forfeit any un-reimbursed amount from that reimbursement.  For example, if there is a $1,000 reimbursement that's next in line for the order of reimbursement payout and only $650 is available to pay out.  The field staff may elect to send an email to reimbursements@reliant.org asking the reimbursement team to pay the $1,000 reimbursement using the available funds, and acknowledging that they forfeit any un-reimbursed portion of that reimbursement. Note: this action is completely voluntary and at the discretion of the field staff.  

Here's a sample email of how to word the email.

"I would like to request that my April (Year-20xx) reimbursement totaling $X be paid out on X date using the available funds in the MTD account for which I am responsible.  I acknowledge that any un-reimbursed funds from this reimbursement will be forfeited and unable to be reimbursed at a future date. "

Exiting Employment with Unpaid Reimbursements

If a field staff is exiting employment and has reached their final month of payroll without receiving enough funds to fully cover the total amount of a submitted reimbursement, Reliant will automatically reimburse a portion (based on available funds) of the submitted reimbursement without the field staff needing to submit a request for partial payment of the reimbursement.

Resolution of Removed or Denied Reimbursement Requests

Reliant may remove or deny expenses or return submitted expense forms due to different reasons. 

Check for Google comments within the Google Doc, your Reliant email or Staffnet for reimbursement notes indicating why a reimbursement or bonus request is being returned or expenses are being denied. It is your responsibility to check your Reliant email and Staffnet for reimbursement notes and to initiate with Reliant if there are questions about those notes. Reliant will notify you via email or Google Drive comments if a form is fully denied.  

If expenses are removed from or denied on an expense submission request, they may be resubmitted on a new form for further review. Be sure to check the guidelines to ensure you have included proper receipt documentation and only include the items that were previously removed on the new form submission. There is no extension to the original submission timeframe deadline for re-submissions. 

If the expense was removed due to a policy issue, a formal exception request must be submitted.

Receipt Guidelines

Reliant requires that itemized receipts for expenses greater than $75 must be submitted along with the appropriate form. (The only exception to the $75 limit is that a receipt is always needed for all hotel/lodging receipts regardless of the amount requested for reimbursement.)

Receipts must include the following itemized details:

• What was purchased
• Total amount paid
• Date
• Name of the company (or person) that was paid
• Your name (if applicable such as for a flight or hotel)

Hand-Written Receipts

Hand-written receipts are acceptable when a printed itemized receipt is not available as long as it contains the following criteria.

Receipts from Mobile/Banking App

For receipts from mobile apps (such as Venmo, Square Cash, PayPal, Google Wallet, or a banking app), please be sure to include a clear description in the memo or "what's it for?" section of the transaction, to document what expense the payment is related to. Be sure to also include with your reimbursement submission any information that is required for a valid receipt, that is not visible on the mobile app "receipt" (see the guidelines above for what details must be included on the itemized receipt for it to be acceptable.) In most cases, receipts for mobile apps will be for shared expenses. Please see the section below for details on receipts for shared expenses.

Receipts for Shared Expenses

If a Reliant field staff pays an individual for a portion of an expense that requires a receipt (the portion is over $75), they will need to submit two receipts.  The field staff submitting the expense will need both a copy of the original receipt with the full expense amount listed from the individual who collected the money and paid for the full expense as well as submitting a hand-written or mobile/banking app receipt for the portion paid to the individual to give Reliant a paper trail for both transactions. Make sure to include all details required for the hand-written or mobile/banking app receipts as detailed above. Remember, if it is for a hotel expense, a copy of the itemized receipt is always required no matter the amount being reimbursed.

Guidelines by Expense Type