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Please note, our Forum rules no longer allow the posting of links to personal fundraising or crowdfunding pages, such as JustGiving. You can read the full set of our Forum rules here.
How to manage a charity credit card
Hi
Our small charity will need a credit card to buy routine requirements such as web hosting etc. When we write cheques they must be signed by two trustees. So how can we have similar oversight control of credit card spending ?
Any advice much appreciated.
Our small charity will need a credit card to buy routine requirements such as web hosting etc. When we write cheques they must be signed by two trustees. So how can we have similar oversight control of credit card spending ?
Any advice much appreciated.
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What you might consider is setting up internal controls: every times someone wants to use their credit card, they complete a short form or take a copy of the order they want to place. Get it signed by whoever's got the authority to do so, THEN the card is used. But it gets quite irksome.
You can almost certainly set single item limits on credit card expenditure.
Web hosting you might be able to settle by direct debit - it depends if the company will send you a paper form (some won't).
If you use a pre-paid credit card (eg. FairFX) it will be possible to load the card with just the amount required to meet a particular payment. Loading the card from the charity bank account can be co-authorized just like any other online payment.
Pre-paid credit cards can be used for almost any transaction for which an ordinary card would work. A FairFX card is just a type of Mastercard.
The only catch is that they charge 1.5% fee for international transactions but UK point of sale transactions are free. FairFX waive the normal business fee of £50 per annum if you are a charity. The card costs £10.
This method dawned on me today as I have used a FairFX card before for personal use. So if your charity requires occasional credit card purchases with full control/authorization this is method should work.
The fees are here
The Maintenance & Support fee of £50 is waived for charities.
Which is fine up to a point but what you really need is a system where any expenditure (maybe above petty cash level) is authorised by two trustees. Once a bill arrives there is generally no option but to pay it, so the oversight needs to be earlier in the process.
All two signatories protects you against is one of the trustees being dishonest. Up to a point you still have that if the credit card bill is settled by cheque but not, presumably, if bills are paid by online banking etc.
Fair enough but, as I said, it only protects you against one or other of the "signatories" being dishonest. In most cases by the time it comes to cheque writing (or making an online payment) the charity has been committed to that expenditure.
The trouble is, the checks often aren't carried out properly, either before or after the event ...