Financial Organization

[Richard McClellan]

Our team is getting ready for its 2nd year to do FIRST, and I have been wondering how the financial organization works with other teams. Last year, we spent close to $5000 on top of our regional fee on materials to build a course, parts for the robot, tools, pit display, etc. This was ultimately funded by a few team fundraisers, some parent donations, and club dues.

All of this cost was initially paid for by 4 of our primary team mentors last year, including myself. After the season was over, everyone compiled receipts, gave them to the school accountant, and checks were cut from the school account with money from the fundraisers and donations. It ended up working alright in the end, but as college students, our bank accounts were beginning to run dry as we neared the end of the season.

For this coming year, we've lost a few mentors, so money is becoming even tighter. It's going to be even more difficult for that $5000 to come from personal accounts. Now, of course, we can turn a few receipts at a time, and get reimbursed as things are being bought, but there still seems to be a 1-2 week turnaround on cutting checks from the school account, plus time to deposit, etc.

So, how do other teams do it? Does anyone have any sort of small business account at a local bank? This seems like a good idea, but it's probably difficult if not impossible to deposit corporate donations into something like this. Does anyone use any sort of team credit cards or debit cards? Or request purchase orders directly from the school?

What about tax? Sometimes it's difficult and not really worth the effort of processing a tax exempt form, especially for online orders, when you would have to fax it, thus delaying the ordering process. While it is best to get purchases tax exempt, these certain cases come up where it is difficult, but our school account will still not reimburse for tax. Have any other teams been able to get around this?