All About Supplies

Hello Staff,

As recently announced at a staff meeting, we have changed the process for ordering supplies. There seems to be a lot of questions surrounding the new process, so I am here to clear up any confusion. Here are the frequently asked questions about supplies:

We used to just order any supplies we needed and everything was charged to admin. Why has this changed?

There are several reasons for the change:

CRHC has grown over the last few years. As a growing company, it is important that we adopt best business practices. It is a best practice to charge expenses directly to a particular program anytime an expense can be directly attributed to that program. This sort of expense tracking allows management to fully understand the actual cost of running each program, resulting in better business decisions.

CRHC has been the recipient of several grants and each of those grants has supplies written into the grant budget. In order to use up the supply line on each grant budget, we need to charge supplies used by that program to the grant.

Related to the grants, the more expenses that we can charge directly to each grant, the more indirect costs we can cover with those same grants, because indirect covered is a percentage of direct expenses. This really helps with covering overhead expenses, such as rent so that we have a healthy bottom line.

The Program Directors budgeted for supplies on their individual department budgets for 2011. They are also being held responsible for sticking to those budgets. Therefore, it is important that they approve any supply orders that will be charged to their programs.

Having the Program Directors sign off on expenses also provides evidence of the supplies being a proper business expense, which keeps our auditors happy!

What is the process for ordering supplies?

If you need a supply, the first thing you should do is look around the supply room to see if you can find it. If you can, take it and it's yours to use. If not, ask Amy for a supply ordering sheet. Amy will give you an order sheet and the supply catalog so you can fill in the order sheet with what you need and which program each item is for. You should then get it signed by your supervisor and give it back to Amy, who will order the supplies for you.

Please note that Amy will order supplies each week on Wednesday. Please plan ahead and get your order in or you will have to wait for the next week.

Which supplies are paid for by the programs and which supplies are paid for by administration?

Common supplies (such as pens, paper clips, post-it notes, etc) will be paid for by administration. The basic rule is that if you can find something in the supply room, it is a common supply and you can take it for your business use.

With that in mind, if you take the last of something, please alert Amy so she can order more.

The following situations will result in the Program paying for the supplies:

• If you need a lot of something that would normally be a common supply (for example, you are going to an event and need a whole box of pens), please order them on a supply order form and have the program pay for it
• If you need supplies that are not found in the supply room, it indicates that you are ordering something that your program should pay for

If you have any further questions about supplies, especially questions about which program should pay for something you are ordering, please see me and I would be happy to help you out.

Thank you,

Jennifer J.