Each member that attends a GM remotely will be allowed to claim back costs towards a meal. This will be £7 per member, and can only be claimed via reimbursement after the meeting.
Costs can be claimed for ingredients used to cook with, or for pre-made or takeaway food. Costs will not be available for drinks of any sort, or for any non-food items.
Costs can be claimed individually, or as a group if members living together are organising food together. Collective claims should be made by one representative of the house with signatures of who else they organised food with.
Food costs can be claimed by submitting receipts to the Secretary, who will confirm the members attendance and forward the request to the office for processing . Receipts must be for food bought on or before the day of the meeting, no food costs incurred after the day of the meeting will be considered.
If a large number of request are made in any given month, the reimbursement may only be available via rent credits on members rent accounts, to make it easier for the office and finance to administrate.
The process of budgeting for food at meetings has always been intended to be communal, so we encourage members to share food together where it is possible and safe, and we will start Zoom GMs a little early to allow for some social time and/or shared meal time before we get to business.
This policy will be reviewed in April, and can be adjusted or adapted based on changing circumstances and how well it is going.
The co-op will provide meals for a maximum of two Working Group Open meetings a year per working group. The provisos are as follows:
That the meeting is an open meeting for all members to attend
That the meeting is made public knowledge and promoted by paper at least 7 days advance notice of the date of the meeting