Budgeting and finance for events

Girlguiding has a finance policy you’ll need to follow for any Girlguiding-run event.

You'll need to do a budget and keep accurate financial records. After the event, you’ll need to complete your finances and then either verify them as part of your level accounts or independently.

Bank account

Depending on the size and nature of your event, you may need to set up a separate bank account for it.

If your event falls within a unit, district, division, county or region and you choose not to set up a new bank account, you’ll need to make sure your accounts follow the same format as the level in which the event is taking place.

If you set up a new bank account for your event, make sure you follow Girlguiding’s finance procedure.

Budget

It’s important to set a budget at the beginning of your event set-up. Think about what costs you need to cover and then work out an event fee based on your expenditure. It’s a good idea to have a contingency (this is usually up to 10% of the overall budget).

Read more about how to set a budget.

Keeping to a budget

It’s important to share your budget with anyone who will have responsibility for ordering or approving financial transactions. Set clear boundaries and expectations with them about what they need to communicate to the event team, and what needs to be escalated further.

If your event is large-scale with lots of people involved, you may want to have ‘payment gates’. At each of these, your event team comes together to review the budget and spend and sales predictions, and approve large expenditure.

Keeping account records

You’ll need to track each payment and expense with a receipt or invoice. You can use Girlguiding’s unit account template (Excel, 602KB) (see also the guidance document for using this template (PDF, 875KB).

You can easily adapt this template for your event. Make the event tabs the different teams, the main income the income the event is bringing in, and the main expenditure tab can become any core event costs.  
 
If you prefer using a different spreadsheet, you need to make sure you record:

• The date the money was spent or received.
• Details of what was bought, or why the money was received.
• Where the money was spent or who it came from.
• How the transaction was made: was it online, in store or cash?
• The amount spent or received.

As with all financial records, it’s good practice to keep them up to date, rather than waiting until the end of the event. This will mean you can report back on budget versus actual spend and make sure you’re meeting any financial targets.

Think about payment approvals:

• Who can approve what?
• Are leads in charge of their budget?
• Do you have different sign-off limits? (For example, team leads can spend up to £500 without approval from the event lead, but the event lead/deputy event lead needs to authorise anything over £500.)

When participants are paying by card, both on the day and beforehand you’ll need to record the gross income in your accounts. You shouldn’t deduct any service fees/charges from the income. These should be an expenditure line in the accounts.

Who can expense what?

As an event team, you’ll need to decide what event volunteers can and can’t claim for during the event. You’ll need to let them know this before the event and send out any expense forms. Make sure you follow all Girlguiding’s finance procedures when paying expenses.

You'll need to think about:

• Accommodation.
• Mileage.
• Public transport.
• Taxis. Are you happy for volunteers to use taxis? Under what circumstances?
• Chaperones. When girls are involved in event planning, you’ll need to think about age restrictions on public transport and allowing the budget for chaperone expenses.

Refunds and cancellation policy

You’ll need to work out your terms and conditions for issuing refunds.

To help with this, check the cancellation policy of the venue you’ve hired, as well as any contractors or third parties you’re using. Work out in what situations participants will have to pay and in what situations you’ll issue a refund.

It’s likely you’ll have a date beyond which you don’t give refunds. This will vary from event to event. It could be that the tickets are non-refundable from point of purchase, or you ask for a non-refundable deposit. It will depend on your event and the point you need to commit financially.

Think about taking out cancellation insurance for your event. As an event team, you’ll need to make sure you have the correct level of insurance for your event.

Find out more about insurance.

Fundraising

You may need to fundraise to make your event happen. It’s important that any fundraising you do is in line with Girlguiding’s fundraising policy. As an event team, you'll need to agree on what will happen to any leftover money once the event is over.  
If you’re applying for grants to fund any of your event, you’ll need to consider the terms and conditions of the grant and what happens if the event is cancelled. Some grants require you to pay back any money received. Some grants are also restricted to specific events.

Read more about fundraising for Girlguiding.

On the day finances

You may need to deal with money on the day of your event. If this is the case, you’ll need to think about petty cash, remote card payments, and how this will work. You’ll need to let participants know in advance if it’s a cash-only or card-only event. If there’s a mix of cash and card payments, which areas take what?