As the Leadership Training Finance Administrator, your role is to oversee how finances are spent and to make sure all Reliant policies are followed.
As you prepare for this role, please read (and share) the following linked pages below:
Send links to Reliant Field Staff attending your LT
- We ask that the finance administrator ensure that all field staff and interns attending their event have been sent and read the pages below before purchasing something that they desire to be reimbursed by the event fund.
- If you are having your Reliant Field Staff or Reliant interns pay an LT fee, please also send the following links:
- Please ensure you add a list of all Field Staff attending LT and their role during LT to the event setup form.
Links to read through as the LT Finance Administrator
- Allowed Event Expenses
- Frequently Used Expense Accounts for Events
- BILL for Spenders
- You will want to send this page to any field staff who will make purchases with a BILL credit card.
- BILL Spend Policy
- BILL for LT Finance Admin
- Leadership Training Finance Agreement
Links to read through as the LT Registration Coordinator
- To view outstanding LT balances for attendees for follow-up, you will need to read Brushfire: Event Registration Site Instructions.
Approvals for forms (account payable requests, invoices, contracts, field staff reimbursements through the event fund, etc.)
- As the finance administrator for LT, you are given permission to be an approver for the event fund (see Supervisor Approval for Google Forms). You are not the supervisor, but you are the signer for the fund, so you would follow the same instructions for approving forms.
- Reliant needs to view and co-sign all contracts, such as housing contracts (if they are outside of the YMCA contract), closing ceremony restaurant contracts, etc. (see Event Contracts).
- Reliant will pay directly for invoices to vendors (ex. rental of sound equipment, payment to sound engineers, band for closing ceremonies, etc.). See Event Accounts Payable Requests and Event Invoices and Payments Requests.
- For large purchases (e.g. online ordering of books or t-shirts, deposits for restaurants, etc.), especially purchases made prior to receiving your BILL access, please get in touch with Reliant as it could be paid for with a Reliant credit card rather than event fund reimbursements.
- Reliant needs a list of all speakers (please add to the Event Speaker Payment Request Form - linked on the LT Event Setup Form) and their desired honorarium amounts. We need monthly lists of speakers as we make transfers at the end of each month for stipends (see Event Honorariums for Churches and Speakers).
- If your speaker needs help paying for flights, please get in touch with the Reliant LT Admin (LT@reliant.org). We can purchase their flight from the LT fund. You may not reimburse this yourself.
- If they are a Reliant employee, they may do a travel advance (see Payroll Advances).
- If you choose to reimburse speaker gifts or other gifts through the event fund, please read Events Gifts Policy before making any purchases for the event.
- If you will have onsite collections (payment for closing ceremonies, shirts, etc. - not LT fees) during your program, please read Event Fee Payments Made By Participant.
- Please read Additional Payments Collected By LT From Both LT Participants And LT Guests.
- Please ignore any old instructions that previous LT event finance administrators may have created, as we change processes often. Please read Solomon instead.
- Send emails and any questions to LT@reliant.org.
LT Program Meals
If your event uses food cards to pay for participants to make their own meals (only offered programs not on YMCA property and lasting more than one month), see Food Cards for Events.
International events would all be using Event Advances and Event Participant Allowance.
The following rules below are not for Event Advances but they are when reimbursing event purchases through Reliant reimbursement forms.
Event Participant Meals
Domestic summer programs typically have many group meals together with the participants. Large group meals, closing ceremony meals, outreach events that include meals, etc. All of these meals (as long as they are within the event budget) can be reimbursed by the event fund (typically by using event advances) and would be included under Event Food.
Event Field Staff Meals Paid for By Event Fund Reimbursements
The instructions below apply to meals that are intended to be reimbursed by the event fund itself.
The program fees paid by the participants for an event were not intended to use to fund all attending field staff meals. So, there is a limit for how many field staff meals an event fund can reimburse.
The event is allowed to reimburse two field staff-only meals (in which event participants aren't also present for the meal). The event is allowed to pay for one field staff-only meal for a kick-off field staff event and then again for the closing of the event, as a celebration of how the event went. They are generally only reimbursable using event advance or the event fund for reimbursement twice during a summer-long event and tend to be at the opening and closing of the program. These costs are in addition to the overall event's kick-off and closing events (in which the event participants are present). Generally, the cost per person for these field staff-only meals should be kept to $35 per person (or less) and per Reliant policy, alcohol is not reimbursable.
The event fund is not allowed to pay for additional field staff bonding events besides the two listed above. However, the event is allowed to pay for additional field staff meals when the field staff are participating in a group meal, along with event participants. So, the event can reimburse meals for both field staff and participants for weekly group meals for the entire event/program. Or, if you picked a few key student (non-staff) leaders for example and invited them to join the field staff team for an ice cream outing to thank them for being leaders at the program then that ice cream could be covered (for everyone from the event fund).
We try to exclude field staff-only food but when students are present and included then it opens the doors for us to to be able to reimburse these types of things. And to clarify it does not have to involve all the participants that are participating in the program for the meal to be covered- if you have a few key leaders attend it then becomes fine to cover the cost for everyone as a reimbursement from the event fund. Please check with your event finance manager before taking participants out for a meal to insure that it was a budgeted item that the event fund can reimburse.
Speaker Meals
It is allowable for the event to use event funds to reimburse groceries purchased for the speaker’s meals during their time at the event.
It is also allowable to include the speaker (and the speaker’s family) in event group meals in which participants and Reliant missionaries are all dining together.
In the case of the summer programs that are located at a YMCA, event funds can be used for paying for speaker and speaker family meals at the cafeteria. Our assumption is payment is being made to the cafeteria directly at the time of the meal, so no invoice is being received from the YMCA for these particular meals. Therefore, maintaining an internal tracking system providing the necessary information is required, as this will be your receipt. Please keep a log that lists the speaker's name, dates they attended LT, the # of meals the speaker/wives/family had (ex. broken down for breakfast/lunch/dinner) and the total amount paid for the speaker meals during their time at LT.
It is also allowable for event funds to be used for the Event Director (or other missionary attending the event with approval from the Director) to take a speaker out to eat for a single meal at a nice restaurant as a thank you. Please keep these meals to less than $40 per person and remember that alcohol cannot be purchased using petty cash funds.
See also Event Honorariums for Churches and Speakers
Meals for meetings with speakers, event employers, landlords, local churches, etc.
There are limits and specific instructions of what can be reimbursed for corporate meals (ex. related to employers, landlords, churches, etc.). It is allowable for event funds to be used by the summer program event director (or other summer program field staff with approval from the director) to take an employer, landlord, or other person such as an event speaker that has assisted the summer program out to eat for a single meal at a nice restaurant as a thank you. Please keep these meals to less than $40 per person and remember that alcohol cannot be purchased using petty cash or event reimbursement funds. See Corporate Gifts (Applicable for Events or Departments).
