Blogs

A culture of openness makes abuse much less likely 3

Governance | John Tate | 5 Jun 2009

Very interesting debate. Having worked in the charity sector for nearly 20 years as a consultant I am afraid I have come across too many examples of where chief execs of charities have abused expense systems for this to be ignored.

To give three specific examples:

1. The chief exec of a large charity purchased a laptop for their personal use when he/she already had been supplied with a computer by the charity. He/she claimed this back on expenses from the charity. This clearly breached the charity’s internal policies and procedures. The finance director of the charity raised this with the chief exec who told the FD to mind his/her own business in no uncertain terms. The FD then raised this to the Chair of the Board and an external investigation took place into this issue. Unfortunately the board backed down from enforcing the charity policy and the FD left. There were 3-4 other similar expense claims made around the same time which were in my opinion outrageous.
2. The chief exec of a second charity travelled business class on all his trips; had private caterers in to provide him lunch many days of the week to ‘entertain’ and purchased wine to be consumed on the premises from a very well-known high-end wine merchant. The FD raised this and other governance issues with the chief exec and was fired almost on the spot. No disciplinary procedure was followed and after initial litigation the case was settled for, if I recall correctly, a six-figure sum – paid for by the charity. The Chair of the board was a family friend of the chief exec.
3. The chief exec of a well-known national charity enjoyed a drink and had a well stocked bar in his/her office. This was supplied by the charity for ‘entertaining’. Come Friday afternoon one or more members of the board would often join the chief exec for an afternoon of meetings/drinking sessions.

I am pleased to say that this is very much the exception rather than the rule and I am sure the vast majority of expenses claims are fair and reasonable.  However there are cases when the exception applies. So let’s be transparent and above board on expenses. At the least it might stamp out some of this abuse. I think it is time for charities to be much more transparent across the board and this would be a good step in the right direction.

So why does Acevo seem reluctant to support this transparency? I don’t buy into the argument that it will take a huge amount of admin to do. Is it that they don’t like the idea of transparency? Or do they want to protect themselves or their members who they feel might be put in an embarrassed situation?

Tweet

Directory: Association of Chief Executives of Voluntary Organisations (ACEVO)