All Yours is incredibly grateful for the support of their volunteers and never wishes anyone to be out of pocket. We hope that you incur very few expenses as a result of volunteering with All Yours, and this document outlines what to do if you find you have to spend money on our behalf.

Please read this document carefully as there are some key points of both All Yours specific policy, and general accounting policy, to which all expenses claims must adhere.

 

General Accounting Policy

 

Expenses vs Remuneration

In all cases, it is important to ensure that the reimbursement of out-of-pocket expenses is not – OR DOES NOT APPEAR TO BE – a disguise for making income payments (remuneration) to the recipient(s).

 

Expenses vs Purchases

While claims for the reimbursement of purchases which have been personally and properly made on behalf of All Yours Period Box CIC are usually made together with claims for the reimbursement of out-of-pocket expenses, they are not counted as expenses. Instead, they are accounted for as part of All Yours’ general expenditure.

 

All Yours Policies

 

Scope of the policy

• Volunteers are entitled to be reimbursed by All Yours for all travelling and other expenses actually, necessarily, reasonably, and incidentally, incurred by them in carrying out their duties, on submission of an appropriately authorised claim form and relevant supporting point-of-sale receipts.  Definitions of the terms actually, necessarily, reasonably and incidentally are described in Appendix 1.

• Expenses may only be incurred, and subsequently reimbursed by All Yours, in respect of activities which are part of All Yours’ agreed and budgeted programme of activities (ie: by PRIOR agreement with the relevant budget-holder).

• Goods and/or services may only be purchased on behalf of All Yours, and subsequently reimbursed, in respect of activities which are part of All Yours agreed and budgeted programme of charitable activities (ie: by PRIOR agreement with the relevant budget-holder).

​

Purchases

• If you have purchased products or items to help with the making of period boxes, you can submit a claim for reimbursement as described in Procedures below, provided you have a receipt. Unfortunately, we cannot reimburse any purchase that does not have a receipt so please do not lose it or delete it!

• You are welcome to submit an expense claim as soon as you have paid for the items, although in case of the need for refund, it might be wise to wait until the purchase has been delivered and you are happy with what you have received.

Travel Expenses

• When delivering All Yours Period Boxes, mileage may be claimed at the HMRC rate of 45p per mile for all vehicles. This covers fuel and wear and tear on your vehicle.

• You may only use your private car in connection with All Yours business if, at the time of each journey, it has a valid: (a) certificate of insurance for the kind of journey involved; (b) road tax (if required); (c) MOT certificate (if more than 3 years old).

• Mileage should be claimed from your home.

• Parking costs incurred when on All Yours business will be reimbursed.

• Parking fines and traffic violation fines will not be reimbursed.

• Under no circumstance will a taxi used to deliver a period box be reimbursed although we will reimburse the cost of public transport in line with our mileage guidance.

• If you deliver a box as part of your journey to another, personal destination, please only claim for the distance from your house to the address and back again. Or, if reasonable, only claim for the additional mileage added to your journey because of diverting to deliver the box. All Yours will not pay for the whole cost of your journey.

Mileage Guidance

• We ask that all volunteers be mindful of the limited funds available to All Yours and to calculate the length of the journey required before delivering an All Yours period box. Where possible please group requests together and deliver only once or twice per week to make your deliveries as cost effective as possible. We tell people to expect to wait at least 14 days for their box so there is no expectation that you will deliver the box as soon as you receive the request.

• It costs us £3.49 to post a box (including the larger family boxes) so please check before setting out that the round journey for one box delivery will not exceed 7.5 miles and therefore cost more than it would to post the box. If it does exceed this limit, please send the request back for posting.

• Please document clearly on the form how many boxes were delivered on each mileage claim so that we can assess the long-term cost effectiveness of hand delivery over Royal Mail.

 

Procedures: Reimbursement of Expenses & Purchases

 

Submitting Claims for Reimbursement of Expenses & Purchases

• Claims for the reimbursement of expenses and purchases must be submitted on the All Yours’ approved claims form and sent to the All Yours Secretary at admin@allyoursbox.co.uk. Claims not on the correct form will not be considered.

• Claims for the reimbursement of expenses and purchases must be accompanied by documentary evidence of the expense (e.g., point-of-sale receipt, travel ticket, etc).  Where such evidence is not available, the claimant must provide a written explanation to the Secretary, who pass to the CEO for approval.

• All Yours Period CIC reserves the right to decline to reimburse expenses for which reasonable documentary evidence has not been provided.

• All expenses claims must be submitted within 35 days of the relevant activity. Expenses may only be claimed later than 35 days with prior approval from the CEO.

 

Authorisation of Claims

• All claims submitted for the reimbursement of expenses incurred on All Yours activities and/or purchases made on behalf of All Yours will be vetted for compliance with CIC law, taxation law and these policies and procedures before being authorised for reimbursement.

• Claims which are not in the prescribed form, incomplete (e.g., missing required supporting documents), inaccurate or otherwise not compliant with relevant legislation will be returned for correction or rejected.

• Valid claims will be authorised for reimbursement by the CEO as soon as is reasonably practical after receipt.

 

Payment of Claims

• Authorised claims will be settled promptly in accordance with electronic banking timescales.

  

Appendix 1

 

Definitions

“Actually” means that the claimant actually incurred the claimed expenditure. eg: the bus fare for a journey cannot be claimed if the claimant had decided to leave earlier and walk the journey instead;

“Necessary” means that the voluntary activity could not have been undertaken efficiently and effectively without incurring the expenditure;

“Reasonable” means that the cost of the expense must be commensurate with prudent, value-for-money use of All Yours’ funds to promote & deliver its charitable purposes. Thus, the cost incurred must be competitive with (i.e., similar to) the costs of alternatives of similar quality and suitability-for-purpose. However, this does NOT mean that the cheapest goods/services must always be purchased. Where the additional benefits TO THE CHARITABLE ACTIVITY BEING PROMOTED/DELIVERED demonstrably outweigh the additional cost of more expensive goods/service they can be chosen in preference to the cheaper alternatives. However, the claimant must always be ready and able to give a credible justification for their choice if challenged.

 “Incidental” means that the expense(s) must not have been determined by considerations unrelated to the charitable activity being promoted/delivered. For example: the claimant had attended a meeting the venue for which had been chosen specifically because it also enabled the claimant to visit a nearby friend. In such a scenario, even though the costs of attending the meeting in that venue would otherwise have been necessary and reasonable, they would not also have been incidental and, therefore would not be eligible for reimbursement.

 

This Policy was last updated on 30 September 2023

Next review due in September 2024