Summary

Llanidloes and District Corona Virus Mutual Aid Fund:

Expense Policy and Financial procedures

The Mutual Aid Fund has been set up to support the work of the Llanidloes and District Covid 19 group in the present crisis. It will be used to help cover the expenses of volunteers, where required, as well as to pre-pay for goods required by the people we are supporting, and to assist those in our community suffering hardship due to sickness, furlough or inability to work during the current lock down.

All expenses from the fund will be made to recognised volunteers of the Covid 19 group and will be covered by either a receipt, or by an ‘invoice’ (a signed, written request for payment detailing the name of the volunteer, the reason for the payment and the amount) where a prepayment is being made to enable a volunteer to support a member of the community.

Expenses may take many forms, from support to volunteers incurring transport costs in the fulfilment of delivering support, to covering the cost of shopping for people unable to pay for the goods or services of which they are in need

All sums to be claimed should not be incurred without prior discussion with the administrators of the fund. All decisions on whether to incur the expense will be based upon the availability of funds, the perceived need for the expense and whether all other alternatives available to meet it have been tried. The fund should therefore be regarded as a fund of last resort to help the most vulnerable members of our community.

A proportion of the fund will also be committed to ensuring that the local food bank “Llani Pantri” started by the Covid 19 support group is stocked with essential items, over and above in kind donations received.

Receipts and invoices will be scans, .pdfs or photographs uploaded to the platform - for approval by one of the three administrators of the fund. As, for the sake of transparency, all submissions and payments are viewable, those volunteers submitting claims should take care not to name the individuals being supported, or to include their payment details. These details will be confirmed by private messaging

The initial administrators of the fund will be Clare Bound, Graham Brand, Alison Bryan and Nick Venti. This arrangement is not set in stone and will be reviewed by the group on a regular basis, depending on the length of the present crisis and any future developments or legacy arrangements that are put in place.

Any funds remaining after the end of the current crisis will either be redistributed to local good causes or used to support ongoing local volunteering efforts aimed primarily at helping people who find it difficult to access shops and services.

All decisions on present and future uses of funds raised will be open to discussion by the members of the local Covid 19 volunteering community.

All volunteers submitting expense claims should be aware that payments will be made into their accounts only on Mondays, Wednesday and Thursdays.

In providing the facilities for administering this fund during the present Covid 19 pandemic, the Social Change Agency are waiving all fees usually payable on money received into the Funds they support until June 2020. Their usual fee rate is 5% on all card payments. Please note that card transaction and Paypal payments also incur fees from the card / service provider – these are generally 1.4% + 20p and 2.4% and 30p respectively. All donations paid into the fund by direct online bank transfer are free of charges.

Thank you for your support.