I did the fundraisers at my elementary school for 5 years. You need to start from square one. I would deduct from your message that the first deposit was already made so you cannot match up checks to each individual order. That would have been ideal. However, you can add up the order copies and compare them to the deposit amount to determine how much you were shorted from that first group.
I used to add up each individual order myself to check the accuracy of the parents addition. Many, many times they added incorrectly which resulted in them underpaying the order or sometimes overpaying the order. You should also do that as well.
I also wrote on the bottom of my copy of the order slip the total in checks and the total received in cash. So I always had a trail for every order received. Sure it took longer, but if anyone EVER needed to audit me, I was easy to do .
Unfortunately, I'm not sure how you would be able to determine which families actually shorted you from the first group or the second if she did not record what checks or cash were received for each order.
I would hold her responsible. I would remind her that she cannot simply turn her back on this and it was her responsibility to speak up and ask for assistance if it was too much for her to undertake. I would seek to recover funds from her since she cannot prove that the orders were shorted by the families that ordered.
!. The Fundraising Chair did something innapropriate with the funds (I would have to assume the cash funds) and things are now not matching up.
or...
2. She did not do anything illegal, but her record keeping got screwed up and everything is off. Due to this she may feel, likely unwarranted, that she is being accused of wrong doing and due to this is taking her non-responsive approach.
Usually trying to see the best in people I would lean towards this being number 2, I hope.
That being said I think legal action is a bit extreme at this point. If after trying everything else she is not willing to cooperate you may need to threaten or actually pursue legal action, but not just yet.
I would say you need to try calling again, or send out an e-mail to her, assuring her that you, nor anyone, feels that anything was done illegally. That you want to help her straigten out the financials on this so that you'll be all set when the orders start coming in. Let her know that you have the orders from the company and that you just need to sit down with her for a half hour or so in order to go through things.
Maybe she'll "come to her senses" and things will work out.
If you have to you can even try the good cop/bad cop approach and explain how some have said to hire an accountant or take legal action (blame it on the boards here), but that you don't feel it needs to get to that point, because you don't think she did anything wrong.
Hopefully it will work out. Good luck and let us know...
I wouldn't jump to legal action just yet. I agree with pz's thoughts. She has probably shut you out because she felt as if she was being accused of something. I wouldn't do anymore with this on my own. You need to find a couple of other board members who can sit down and go through all of the info and see if they can figure it out. Hopefully, they can reach out to your chairperson and get her involved too.
If you're unsure if everyone has paid, then that is where you should begin. You've matched checks with orders, so that is done. Have there been any deposits made in relation to this fundraiser? Verify those if so. Then I would send a letter home to parents reminding them to get all of their money in-set a date for this to occur. After that, reassess how much you are off and go from there. Maybe you will just have to "eat" the difference.
It might be time to put some firmer financial controls in place too. REQUIRE that two people count the money would be a good start.
Let's run this idea by a few others on the message board....
It sounds like accusations were perceived to have been made. Do you both have a common friend that can intervene? Give them a copy of everything you have. They need to do this one on one. No Phone calls, No email. Phone calls and Email are the wrong medium if you want to get cooperation. They might ask her "What's going on?" They can hear her side of the story, empathize with her and then offer to help figure out things. That person can go a long way toward helping restore a relationship that is suffering right now.
New Poster Here: I have a situation that I am not sure how to resolve. I am President of PTO and we recently had a fundraiser that raised over 17K. My fundraiser chair informed me that that all the orders and money matched until approx. 10 late orders came in. The orders were faxed to the supplier and money was given to the chair. Eleven days later I put in a call to her for another issue and that is when she indicated that the money turned in didn't match orders and she was done with it. It came to over $900 missing. She did not keep copies of the orders nor did she have any record keeping to support her claim. I called supplier and got copies of the orders then when through the process of matching checks with orders (195).
I called her to let her know that we needed to check with the "problem" orders and ask if there was money to be collected or if they turned in cash. I also told her I wanted to talk with her regarding the fact that there was no way that she could have had a correct total to begin with (prior to the late orders). The late orders only accounted for $157 unaccounted for.
She will now not take my phone calls, she said this is stressing her out in an email sent to me. I had to take it to the principal and ask for guidance. The principal agrees with me that we need to sit down with her to figure out how we are missing money. The fundraiser chair wants no part of it. Do we now take legal action? We are bonded as a PTO. But I would like to think that the money was just not turned in and she just has bad record keeping. By the way, this is her second year as fundraiser chair. Last year she counted the money with her co-chair. This year she did not.
My first response is to send a general message out to the parents that if they have not turned in their money yet, please do so before item pick up and see where we stand from there. But my gut also is concerned with her response. If you didn't do anything wrong, wouldn't you want to clear up the problem as best you can?
I am not sleeping nights, this has me in knots! Please give me any advice you can muster up for me...I sure do appreciate it!
