Finance Training 201920 Picture What is Your Role

Finance Training 2019/20 Picture?

What is Your Role? • President & Treasurer. • Together, you have primary responsibility for all your society’s finances. • You are responsible for paying in money received through events and fundraising, and for authorising all expenses (President only where Picture? the Treasurer is claiming back). • You must attend Executive Committee meetings and Society General Meetings, and present a detailed summary of the society's accounts at the Society’s Annual General Meeting • You must attend meetings called by the Societies Team, together with any training which the role requires.

What’s in Your Account? • Budgeted Fund Ø When people buy a membership for your society, the money (after VAT has been deducted) will display in this part of your weekly finance report. Ø Picture? You can spend this money on things that meet your society’s aims and objectives - for example if your aims and objectives were to encourage more postgraduate to join, you could spend £ 50 on snacks and refreshments for a Welcome Week mixer event. Ø Your budgeted funds can be spent on things that will benefit all members, or that all members have had an opportunity to benefit from – for example if you wanted to spend £ 50 on food for an event, the event would need to be open to ALL members, even if they don’t all attend.

What’s in Your Account? • Non-Budgeted Fund Ø Your non-budgeted funds may include money left from the previous year if the society had any left over. Ø Any additional money added to this fund will come from money raised Picture? through events such as fundraisers, shows/concerts, game nights etc. Ø You can use your non-budgeted funds to buy items that aren’t in your aims and objectives - for example you may wish to run a competition at a stall where 5 winners can win a ticket each to a Cine 10 screening and as this isn’t something that everyone can benefit from, the money can’t come from the budgeted fund and therefore needs to come from the non-budgeted fund.

IMPORTANT • Any money that your society has cannot be used to purchase alcohol unless there have been exceptions authorised by the Societies Team – for example if your society’s aims and objectives focus around discovering and trying different types of gin/beer etc. Picture? • Any money that your society has cannot be used to purchase drugs or any other illegal substances. • The Societies Team has the right to reject any invoice or expense claim – please check with us before you make any payment if you are unsure whether you will be reimbursed for any particular item.

IMPORTANT • All income and expenses must go through the Student Union’s official bank account – never offset expenses against income and pay in the difference. This avoids VAT and therefore would be illegal. • It is also illegal for a society to open a separate bank account, or for any member to pay any society money into their own account. If a society does this, there will be consequences faced and you could potentially face instant closure. • BUT - if your society raises money for charity you must either claim expenses from your non-budgeted fund – if members agree - or deduct the amount from the money raised, then pay the remainder into the RAG account. This is because the SU is a registered charity, and so cannot make direct payments to other charities. It is not illegal because no VAT is levied on money raised for charity.

How Can a Budget Be Helpful? • Prioritisation Framework – essentially this means that you can set out your planned events at the start of the academic year and prioritise where you think you will want your money to go. This means that all members of the society should have a clear idea of what budget Picture? different events will have. It will also allow you to plan for any events that you expect to receive income from – whilst an expected amount of income shouldn’t be included in a budget plan, you can start to plan how much you are aiming to raise. • Funding – Member contributions, fundraising, crowdfunding etc – setting out your budget in a plan will allow you to establish how much money you will want to raise in order to maximise the potential of events throughout the year.

Value Added Tax Societies must pay VAT at a rate of 20% on any income they receive. For example: • Membership costs £ 5. 00 - you get £ 4. 16 and HMRC gets 84 p. • Event ticket costs £ 15. 00 – you get £ 12. 50 and HRMC gets £ 2. 50. • Cake sale raises £ 50. 00 – you get £ 41. 67 and HRMC gets £ 8. 33. You can claim back any VAT you pay when you buy goods or pay for travel but only if you ask for a VAT receipt when you pay. Shops such as Tesco are happy to do this, but you must ask. It is very important to allow for VAT when calculating your income versus costs, or you may make a loss. *To calculate the VAT just divide by 1. 2 *

Claiming Expenses • Normally, members pay for items upfront, then claim back expenses – however, we can pay larger amounts upon invoice, or purchase items on your behalf. (Note – invoices MUST be made out to the University of Essex Students Union. ) • Expense Picture? forms must be completed by the person claiming the money, and signed by the Treasurer. • However, if Treasurers are claiming expenses themselves, then the form must be signed by the President. • Reimbursements are usually made in cash, so bring ID. Large sums (over £ 250) will be paid via bank transfer, so please provide your details along with the form.

Invoices • Invoices usually come from scenarios such as where societies hire performers for events or reimburse travel costs for guest speakers, for example. • Invoices need to clearly state the bank details of whom the money will be sent to, the date in which they provided Picture? a service and a good description of what the service was. • Any invoice stating foreign currency will be equivalent to the conversion rate as of the day that the SU Finance team process the invoice, unless the person being paid has also provided a conversion as of the day that they completed the invoice.

Invoices • The SU Finance team work on a Wednesday-Wednesday weekly schedule – please remember that! • Where an invoice is processed on a Wednesday, the recipient should receive their payment on the Friday of that same week at the latest, unless there has been some error. Picture? • Please send all invoices to susocs@essex. ac. uk by Tuesday’s at 14: 00 if you wish for the recipient to receive their money by the Friday of that week – any received after this time will be placed into the following week’s payment run. • Please also be wary of sending invoices and expense claims over busy periods or periods where there may not be staff in, for example of the winter break.

Invoices • Please plan events in as much advance as possible so that invoices can be dealt with in good time. • Most companies will provide invoices, although some may seem reluctant – invoices are the easiest way for us to make payments directly from your society’s funds and means you do not have to make large payments from your own personal Picture? bank account. • So, for example, if you are arranging a society trip to Rollerworld, plan this as far in advance as possible so that you can acquire an invoice from Rollerworld and have it paid in good time to confirm your booking. • Again, please ask the Societies Team for advice before agreeing to any invoices.

Large Payments/Use of Charge Card • We advise against anyone making large payments as we don’t want you to potentially struggle financially whilst waiting to be reimbursed. Picture? • The SU Finance team can make larger one-off payments for you, but please speak to us first before making that decision. • Societies and the Finance Team also have charge cards that can occasionally be used – this is only really for necessities though and sometimes the monthly spending limit will have already been reached, so don’t rely on this if you can manage otherwise.

External Speakers • Societies cannot pay fees to external speakers. • You can pay their travel costs, the cost of a meal (excluding alcohol) and the cost of printing any Picture? materials. • If a member of your society collects a speaker by car, petrol costs can be refunded at a rate of 25 p per mile – please provide a screenshot of the calculated distance. http: //www. theaa. com/route-planner/index. jsp

Sponsorship Societies are allowed to seek sponsorships from external organisations, so long as: • The sponsor’s aims do not conflict with Students’ Union policy. • The agreement is approved by the Societies Team and signed by the Finance Director of the Students’ Union. SOCIETY REPRESENTATIVES ARE NOT PERMITTED TO ENTER INTO ANY FORM OF CONTRACT ON BEHALF OF THEIR SOCIETY. REMEMBER – MOST CONTRACTS ARE NOT FORMAL, SIGNED DOCUMENTS. MANY ARE ESTABLISHED BY A CONVERSATION, TEXT OR SOCIAL MEDIA MESSAGE, OR EMAIL – SO NEVER AGREE TO ANYTHING BEFORE CONSULTING WITH US.

Fundraising • Generally, you should buy what you need for a fundraising event before the event and claim back your money as normal through an expense form. • However if the items you are purchasing for a fundraiser costs a bit more, (e. g. if you wanted to purchase a ‘dunk tank’), plan this in advance and get the company to invoice the SU for the item. • When paying in any money raised, use the RAG form – this can be collected from the main SU corridor. • For fundraising events, please take a float with you to give people change when they buy something – the SU cannot provide these. Get at least one other member of your society to check the amount of the float before you start selling anything so there won’t be any disputes at the end of the day.

Fundraising • Click Funding is another way you can fundraise money for your society https: //click. hubbub. net/ • Click is the University of Essex crowdfunding platform. Crowdfunding is funding a project or venture by raising lots of small amounts of money from a large number of people. • Click will match donations up to £ 250 – so if you raise £ 250, you will get £ 500. • You have to set a minimum amount to be raised and if this is not raised, you will get no money and people who pledged won’t have the money taken from their bank accounts. • The money is only available to use AFTER the projected has reached its completion date so make sure your Click project finishes a good time before your event takes place or before you need to purchase something.

Paying Money In • When paying any other money in (e. g. if you’ve had a bake sale to raise funds for an upcoming event) then use the paying in form, which can be collected from the SU Reception. • This money will appear in your non-budgeted funds on your weekly finance report. • You can also pay money into your society’s account using the SU’s bank details – please email us for these details as and when you need them. • If you are paying money in using a bank transfer then you will also need to email sufinance@essex. ac. uk stating your name, your society’s name, the exact amount, and the nature of the donation/payment. This is so that the finance team can apply the correct tax code to the payment. This is the same for any sponsorships or donations made from external organisations to your society.

Weekly Reports • Treasurers and Presidents receive weekly automated reports stating the current balance and transaction history of their Picture? society’s account. • You should check through them carefully to keep track of expenses, and identify any errors.

Other Things To Note • Any member of a society has the right to request to view the weekly finance report by submitting a request in writing to either the President or Treasurer of their society. • If all other means of fundraising/seeking sponsorship has been exhausted, then you can submit an application for a small grant from the Students Union (max £ 100). The request will be reviewed by the VP Student Experience sabbatical officer and/or the Societies Team – this may not be accepted however so do not rely on this. Picture?

Any Questions? Email - susocs@essex. ac. uk