How does your team make purchases?

[Nemo]

In addition to the response I submitted (PO + credit card combination), I'll mention the following:

In my first 2-3 years, I put almost everything on a personal credit card and got reimbursed. I never want to go back to that. Even though a system like that makes it easy to buy stuff on the spot as soon as the need comes up, it's bad from a school perspective (paper trail not as good, easier theoretical chance of unethical shenanigans) and it's very inconvenient from my personal finance perspective. I much prefer doing all of the purchasing through the proper channels.

Of course, there's also that parallel purchasing system: mentor or coach simply buys stuff on their own and donates it. I don't even want to know how much that adds up to.

Overall, I've found it very important to have a good relationship with administrators that is built on their ability to trust me with the team's finances. They don't like it when an account goes way in the hole.

[AllenGregoryIV]

We have a school credit card but for most large purchases ($1,000+) they prefer that I put in a check request but if I need to I can still put it on the card if it's time sensitive. This is definitely the best system I have ever worked under.

Back in high school we would make purchases thorough our Vice Principle. We would meet them at their office first thing in the morning and get on their computer and buy things and have them do the check out process on the school credit card.

I've also done the full reimbursement thing, that was an interesting year. I got a new credit card (0% interest for a few months) just for that and was probably putting close to a $1,000 a week on it during build season. Luckily they were pretty fast with the reimbursement checks.

[AdamHeard]

The treasurer of our non-profit (which is what we run our funds through, not the school) has credit cards we order with. The cards are paid off with the team account.

It's hard to get a school to jive w/ such a system, but it is a huge competitive advantage to be able to order what and when you want (as long as you're within budget).

[Nemo]

Originally Posted by AdamHeard

The treasurer of our non-profit (which is what we run our funds through, not the school) has credit cards we order with. The cards are paid off with the team account.

It's hard to get a school to jive w/ such a system, but it is a huge competitive advantage to be able to order what and when you want (as long as you're within budget).

It's possible to be pretty agile with a combination of open purchase orders and credit cards if the district and team are both doing their parts effectively. For a handful of vendors that get used often, it's not that difficult to create open purchase orders in advance and then order stuff as you go. Those types of orders aren't any more cumbersome for me than buying with a credit card on the spot.

The trouble always comes in when either the team or the district isn't able to use actual sense to make decisions. I know that some places have super strict purchasing rules, and I'm sure that creates some real headaches and even lowers the competitive ceiling for a team.

[wilsonmw04]

Ask if your school will allow blanket PO's
I simply write 5-6 PO's for the season for my vendors and I use them as lines of credit with them. (AndyMark is VERY good with this). I have them written right after Thanksgiving so they are back to me before Winter Break. I email the vendors a copy of the PO requesting they keep them on file for my team this season and off we go. Some Vendors have to be reminded each time that there is a PO on file, but there has never been an issue with a vendor refusing to use this method.

[Libby K]

While things like registration or travel reservations (on a more open timeline) are done with PO's or by sponsors granting directly to our FIRST account, almost everything we need right this second is done on personal credit cards and reimbursed later (which the school is painfully slow at).

I definitely don't recommend it, but it's what we do to make it work. It's absolutely agonizing for a group of mentors with lives, families, college bills, etc - to look at the purchase we want to make and decide whose credit card is going to take the hit... thankfully we get in back in the end. The waiting period just isn't super fun.

Silver lining positivity: It makes us think hard about what we need & how badly we need it!

[BrendanB]

For the most part our team has made purchases on personal credit cards/cash which was previously reimbursed by the school (painfully slow) and over this summer we moved to 4-H which has given us financial control so we've moved a good portion of our finances to an account we control. We are still making purchases on personal credit cards however reimbursement can take place at one of our meetings as long as our treasurer is given a heads up.

For our time sensitive robot build parts we used the above for our first few seasons however we have been very fortunate to have a generous local sponsor who handles our part orders instead of giving us a check. This is something you could approach a current sponsor if they would consider doing or ask if they would donate Visa/American Express gift cards which gives you direct access to donations you could use for spending on time sensitive parts. If you've had a strong relationship with a sponsor they might consider helping you out if you explain that your 6 weeks would be more productive if you weren't spending days waiting for orders to arrive because of the hassle in getting orders sent out.

[Marcow]

Originally Posted by Libby K

While things like registration or travel reservations (on a more open timeline) are done with PO's or by sponsors granting directly to our FIRST account, almost everything we need right this second is done on personal credit cards and reimbursed later (which the school is painfully slow at).

Same here, we use a mix of credit cards and on hand cash from fundraiser that we just don't deposit into our account for when we have to run out and get something.