Expenses
Published on March 16, 2025 by Chloe Spedding
Kia ora koutou,
It seems to be a busy time at the moment for Collectives getting expenses paid out, so I thought it would be timely to publish some answers to frequently asked questions :)
When will I get paid?
We have a weekly payment run process. If you want to be paid out in any given week, make sure you submit your expenses by the end of Tuesday. We'll then do our due diligence on them (we're just making sure you're still doing what you said you would do, and that you are adhering to NZ charity law). If everything looks fine to us, then we will action the payment and money will usually land in your account on a Thursday.
What information do I need to put in the expense submission in order for it to be approved by you?
The most common reason for us to withhold payment on your expense is due to lack of documentation. Remember that TGT is the legal entity responsible for all your payments, it's our charity status at stake if we pay out expenses we shouldn't. To make sure every expense we pay meets NZ charity law, we need to have all the details of exactly what the payment is for. Our preferred method for this is for you to provide evidence - upload receipts and invoices. We know that you can only upload one document per line item when you submit expenses, but if you have more, you can upload unlimited amounts of images as private comments :) You'll just need to convert pdfs to jpegs to do this.
Can I avoid asking the provider to put their details in the platform? I'd prefer to do everything myself than ask suppliers to submit expenses.
The Open Collective platform is designed for people to either submit their own expenses, or invite others to submit expenses. If you find yourself in a situation where you don't want to make the supplier submit an invoice through the platform, there is a way around this that allows you to submit the expense yourself. I can create vendors, and you can them select them from the drop down menu when choosing the payee. If you need me to create a vendor, you just need to email [email protected] with Name, Email and Bank account details for the payee. Please do this well in advance of needing the payment made - remember I'm just a human and only work part time :)
Are there fees on expenses paid out?
Gift Collective doesn't charge any fees on payments going out. However, we use a third party payment provider to make payments and there are payment processing fees involved - it's usually $1.38 per expense (unless it's an international payment and then it's more). Please make sure you have this extra $1.38 in your budget when submitting expenses.
I wasn't in charge at the beginning so I didn't receive the onboarding call. I now need to submit expenses and I don't know how.
No problem! There is a lot of information available online that can help you. Check out the videos on our website that walk you through how to submit expenses. The platform's documentation is also very helpful - check out the Help & Support tab at the bottom of any Open Collective platform page if you have tech questions. The Expenses section can be found here. If you've checked out both of these and still have questions, please email me and we can schedule a video call.
Hope this helps!
Chloe
It seems to be a busy time at the moment for Collectives getting expenses paid out, so I thought it would be timely to publish some answers to frequently asked questions :)
When will I get paid?
We have a weekly payment run process. If you want to be paid out in any given week, make sure you submit your expenses by the end of Tuesday. We'll then do our due diligence on them (we're just making sure you're still doing what you said you would do, and that you are adhering to NZ charity law). If everything looks fine to us, then we will action the payment and money will usually land in your account on a Thursday.
What information do I need to put in the expense submission in order for it to be approved by you?
The most common reason for us to withhold payment on your expense is due to lack of documentation. Remember that TGT is the legal entity responsible for all your payments, it's our charity status at stake if we pay out expenses we shouldn't. To make sure every expense we pay meets NZ charity law, we need to have all the details of exactly what the payment is for. Our preferred method for this is for you to provide evidence - upload receipts and invoices. We know that you can only upload one document per line item when you submit expenses, but if you have more, you can upload unlimited amounts of images as private comments :) You'll just need to convert pdfs to jpegs to do this.
Can I avoid asking the provider to put their details in the platform? I'd prefer to do everything myself than ask suppliers to submit expenses.
The Open Collective platform is designed for people to either submit their own expenses, or invite others to submit expenses. If you find yourself in a situation where you don't want to make the supplier submit an invoice through the platform, there is a way around this that allows you to submit the expense yourself. I can create vendors, and you can them select them from the drop down menu when choosing the payee. If you need me to create a vendor, you just need to email [email protected] with Name, Email and Bank account details for the payee. Please do this well in advance of needing the payment made - remember I'm just a human and only work part time :)
Are there fees on expenses paid out?
Gift Collective doesn't charge any fees on payments going out. However, we use a third party payment provider to make payments and there are payment processing fees involved - it's usually $1.38 per expense (unless it's an international payment and then it's more). Please make sure you have this extra $1.38 in your budget when submitting expenses.
I wasn't in charge at the beginning so I didn't receive the onboarding call. I now need to submit expenses and I don't know how.
No problem! There is a lot of information available online that can help you. Check out the videos on our website that walk you through how to submit expenses. The platform's documentation is also very helpful - check out the Help & Support tab at the bottom of any Open Collective platform page if you have tech questions. The Expenses section can be found here. If you've checked out both of these and still have questions, please email me and we can schedule a video call.
Hope this helps!
Chloe
on