Bishop can't correct a mistake on an expense during the review phase

[jeremytp]

I'm a bishop and I'm facing a difficult situation regarding a reimbursement for a youth activity. A young women leader submitted several receipts for reimbursement. The financial clerk entered them into LCR, but added up the total of the receipts incorrectly so that the reimbursement amounts do not match the receipts. A bishopric counselor approved it without noticing the mistake. Now, the system is asking the bishop (me) to review it. I can see that there's a discrepancy of about $30, but the only option that I am given is to check the box and then click "Reviewed". I am not given the option to reject the expense or correct the mistake. There is a button that says "Adjust Expense", but it seems that that button only allows me to adjust the budgetary category, not to adjust the amount or to reject the expense so that we can start over again.

What's the correct procedure if a mistake is found in the bishop's review? If there is no way for a bishop to reject it at this phase, then why even ask the bishop to review it at all?

[eblood66]

All expenses should be approved by the bishop before they paid. But this approval can be verbal and does not require that the bishop review the documentation--just that the bishop approves of the purpose of the expense and the approximate amount is ok. Clerks and councilors should ensure that they have this approval from the bishop before signing an check or approving an expense in LCR.

The clerk and second approver (the councilor in this case) are then responsible for ensuring that the expense has the appropriate documentation and amounts are correct. Once the 2nd approval has been made LCR will immediately start processing the reimbursement and it will be paid without further delay.

Eventually the bishop must record his approval formally by marking the expense as reviewed in LCR. The only option is to mark that the expense was approved before it was paid or leave it blank to show it was not. If it's left blank it will trigger an audit exception and corrective action will be required as part of the audit.

In this case I assume you probably approved of the overall expense and approximate amount. So you should probably mark the expense as approved (unless you were not aware of the expense before hand). The Bishop's Review isn't about checking for mistakes in the processing.

There are a few options for correcting the mistake. If the expense was a check which has't been cashed, then just void the expense, cut out the signatures and file the voided check and then reissue. If the expense is an electronic reimbursement which was just recently approved then there may be an option to void or cancel the expense in the expense details. It doesn't sound like either of those apply here.

If none of those apply then there is no way to avoid having the incorrect expense paid. The only remedy then is to ask the member to return the difference and deposit it back in the category the expense came from. In that case you want to write up a report of what happened including the date and amount of the return, sign it, have the clerk sign it and file it with your expense documentation so that the auditor can review it to verify that it was corrected.

[jpjones~ogr]

Well said eblood66.

Maybe 18 months ago I discovered reimbursement of one receipt twice to the same member. Now I dig deeper when receipt dates are older than the last reimbursement to a person.

Documenting the reason for the newer reimbursement being less, than the total of all receipts, seemed to work well. The bishop and our auditor didn't fuss about it.

To avoid math mistrakes for somewhat complicated reimbursements I build a temporary spreadsheet. I may add PDFs of sheets to digital support documentation, so auditors ask fewer questions.

[drepouille]

Exactly right. When I was ward clerk, I also created temporary spreadsheets for complicated receipts. As you do, I printed the spreadsheet to a PDF, and uploaded the PDF to the expense documentation. If I found anything confusing about the receipt(s), I would contact the member before processing the reimbursement request. Unfortunately, members of the bishopric would sometimes jump in and approve the expense before I had completed my review process. That is why I always preferred to have receipts sent directly to me for review.

[jdlessley]

Unfortunately, members of the bishopric would sometimes jump in and approve the expense before I had completed my review process.

I avoid this by rejecting the expense. This places it in the Pending tab with my reason for rejecting it easy for anyone curious about it to see. To date, I have had no one approve a rejected expense while I work with those involved to resolve questions and issues with a payment request.

[jpjones~ogr]

After rejecting member initiated expenses can they be re-enabled (un-rejected)? or Do you save their submissions and start fresh?

I've saved attachments and started fresh. I delete some because one item is created for each low dollar receipt even though all are payable to the same person, or math issues, or unreadable images, and other problems.

[ Maybe I'm wrong, but instructions for LCR finance are either not generally available or are have significantly delayed availability, so I tend to come to the Forum for insights and answers on features that lack intuitivity (new word?). ]

Currently I don't have a member initiated expense to fiddle with. (Our members are becoming less likely to initiate their own reimbursements because of short-term or long-term glitches, and lack of interest in learning a process they rarely use which happens to be kinda weird to them.)

[jdlessley]

After rejecting member initiated expenses can they be re-enabled (un-rejected)? or Do you save their submissions and start fresh?

Rejecting a payment request, which is actually done when an attachment is being reviewed, places the payment request in the Pending Expenses tab (ref: Record Expenses and Reimbursements, Rejected Expenses section). Any previous approval, if any, is cancelled. Any changes can be made while it is pending. Attachments can be removed and/or new attachments added. The amount of the payment request can be changed, payee can be changed, the category can be changed or category/categories added, and so on. It is as if the expense payment was started as a fresh/new entry at the Expenses > Enter Expenses tab.

I've saved attachments and started fresh.

This approach is a method that works when multiple payment requests are submitted for the same person from Member Tools because of the single attachments limitation but there are multiple receipts. I have done something similarly except by rejecting the first payment request, downloading the attachments from the other payment requests, and then attaching them to the first payment request. The first payment request, in the Pending tab, is edited to adjust to the total amount. As a note, I only do this for check payments. With EFT payments there is less work on my part just approving each payment request rather than going through the download process, uploading to the first payment request, editing the first payment request, and then deleting the unneeded payment requests.

I encourage organization presidencies to submit payment requests through LCR when there are multiple receipts that cannot be combined into one image. For example, if there are three register strip receipts, and they want to submit the payment request through Member Tools, I tell them to put the three receipts side by side and take a picture for one image.

[jdlessley]

Getting back to the OP's issue;

I can see that there's a discrepancy of about $30, but the only option that I am given is to check the box and then click "Reviewed". ... What's the correct procedure if a mistake is found in the bishop's review? If there is no way for a bishop to reject it at this phase, then why even ask the bishop to review it at all?

The other option is to not check the box and contact the clerk about the error. The clerk can then copy the payment request information for a new expense payment, download all attachments, cancel the erroneous expense payment and start a new expense payment from scratch. You can also start the new expense payment from scratch. But passing the workload back to the clerk is, in my opinion, the proper procedure for a bishop. The clerk's calling is to take the workload off the bishop. An expense payment made by EFT requires timely action to stop the payment before the banking systems complete the transaction. Go into LCR Finance > Expenses > Expenses Summary to see the expense status. A status of 'Issued' may still be able to be cancelled. This is done by clicking the EFT hyperlinked reference number to open the payment in the Expense Detail view and clicking the Cancel button, if available.

Since the OP has been a number of days ago, what I just recommended has now probably been overcome by time and action already taken, or bank EFT payment processing completed. If the expense payment was 'reviewed' by the bishop and the payment made, the action to take at this time is to correct the error in another transaction.

If a paper check was the payment instrument and the payee has not cashed the check, then ask the payee to return the check. Void that check with the reason being the payment amount error. Reprocess the expense payment with the error corrected.

A cashed check and a completed EFT payment are handled essentially the same to correct the error. If the error was an over-payment, then contact the payee about the error and request they submit a return of the over-payment. This is processed in the same manner as a return of excess advance expense payment. If the error was an underpayment, then process another expense payment to pay the remaining due. In a note, as an attachment, explain the situation of the underpayment and include the original expense payment reference number.

[jpjones~ogr]

These are great insights on EFT's! We'll probably never need to cancel one, but knowing we have an option helps.