The bigger the district, the more bureaucracy. When I worked in a country 1A, I could stop by the admin office in the morning, sweet-talk the super's secretary, and by end of day she would have a check (hand-written from the checkbook in her desk drawer) signed and ready. In my current district it takes at least a week to get a purchase order, they only write checks on Thursdays, and only if it's approved by Tuesday.
Definitely check with your people in your new district for the details, but these are the broad strokes of what you have to do.
1 - vendor must be on the vendor list. Find out NOW what that process is. In some places you can only add to the list certain times of year. In some districts this is very cumbersome. Some places it's a one-page application that can be approved in a day or two.
2 - contact the vendor and ask for a "quote" or "estimate" for the things you want to buy. This is an official document offering to sell you certain goods or services at a certain price. In some districts you can go on the website, put everything in your shopping cart and print that off as a "quote."
3 - submit your quote to whoever writes your POs. Usually campus secretary but maybe someone in central office.
4 - Purchase order is written and approved. Send the PO to the vendor. This is an official document where the district agrees to buy the goods or services for the specific price. For most vendors who work with schools, this is enough for them to ship the product. Some will want pre-payment.
5 - Vendor delivers the product/service.
6 - Vendor sends you an invoice. This is an official request for payment.
7 - Submit the invoice to whoever processes those. Usually the same person who writes your POs. You may have to sign the invoice or do an online check-off to acknowledge that you received the items on the invoice.
8 - Check is submitted to your accounts payable, probably needs some approvals, but then check is printed.
This process can take a long time. Your PO person is probably overworked. There are probably 3 people above them who have to approve the PO and then the check. Especially the first few times you do this, someone will probably reject it and make you do it differently. I usually try to get my PO request in at least 2 weeks ahead of time, farther if possible.
You will likely have at least 2 different accounts. Maybe more. Some will have sub-accounts. Each will have different rules.
199 aka school budget - you will get a certain amount of money in this account at the start of the school year. It may be broken out into separate categories (travel, supplies, repairs, etc) or maybe it's all just one big sum. Anything you don't spend by the budget deadline (usually around spring break) they will take back. Find out when the cutoff is and spend all of this money before then. I try to spend it all in the fall semester. Many districts this year cut off spending on very short notice when the legislature did not pass any school funding increase.
461 aka activity fund - this is more like a bank account. Your fundraiser money goes in here and then you can spend it. This account does roll over, you can do a fundraiser in the spring to have money for summer activities. Usually you can spend out of this account for most of the year.
You may also have a booster account. In some places that account goes through the school. Sometimes it's completely separate. Booster money has fewer restrictions and is easier to spend, but requires your booster board to approve things.
Don't assume you can be reimbursed for buying things out of pocket. I can get a reimbursement in an urgent situation (like something broke on Friday night and we need it for Saturday contest) but otherwise it has to go through the whole process.
The other advice on this page is good. Definitely ask as many questions as you can. And expect that you'll run into some situation that you didn't think of and have to expedite or re-do some paperwork.
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