[Spi-private] Very long wait for funds transfer

[Martin Michlmayr]

* Ian Jackson <ijackson at chiark.greenend.org.uk> [2016-12-20 18:14]:
> Would every board member please reply to this thread, explaining
> what steps should be taken (both immediately, and in the medium and
> long term) to remedy the situation.

I think we all agree that SPI's handling of reimbursements needs to be
improved and that this is the top priority given that this is what
SPI's associated projects rely on most.

I cannot speak about the specific issue Joshua raised and hope
Michael will comment.  I can speak about the situation in general,
though.

While there are clearly problems that need to be fixed, what people on
this thread don't realize is that major improvements are being made.
Over the last six months or so, there has been a lot of progress in
moving away from a spreadsheet that only Michael understands to a
ledger-based system to which several board members actively
contribute.  I'd like to thank Michael, Martin, Dimitri, Tridge and
others who have worked on this.

I know there have been several calls to "just hire paid help", and
while I agree that this might be a good solution long-term, "just"
going out and hiring something isn't something you can do.  We need to
understand the current system, where the bottlenecks are, how we're
going to manage the contractor, etc, before we can implement a
solution.  SPI has had some paid help in the past and it didn't work
well, so we have to make sure a contractor can be effective before we
get one.  Again, progress is being made in these areas, but I am aware
this is not very visible.

Furthermore, SPI donated some money to Software Freedom Conservancy to
help with the creation of tools that will make reimbursements easier.
While there hasn't been a lot of progress until recently, Conservancy
hired someone a few months ago so we're also expecting to see progress
in that area.

We'll have another face-to-face board meeting in February and these
topics (reimbursements, treasurer reports, getting paid admin help)
are a big item on the agenda.

Martin

President, Software in the Public Interest, Inc.