Reimbursement for election packet printing

Started by HenryS7 • 13 replies • 302 views

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HenryS7 (Pennsylvania)
Posts: 336

Posted:

We are in the process of sending out our election packet. It is 7 pages, double sided (so 4 physical pages). We have 274 homeowners. Due to limitations with the equipment of the property manager, I ended up using my personal printer to print out the election packet. It was a total of 1,096 physical pages with a page count of 1,918 color prints.

I clearly need to get reimbursed but have no idea how to fairly charge the association for this work. Professional companies would charge $0.25 per page, or about $500 for the print job. Our property manager would have charged us this rate if their printer would have handled the print job. I clearly didn't use up $500 of supplies, but I don't know much it cost me.

How much should I ask the association to pay for printing the election packet?

AugustinD
Posts: 3,698

Posted:

To come up with a reasonable amount to bill the HOA for this, you will need:

-- the cost of a color cartridge;

-- the yield of a color cartridge (as advertised by the manufacturer), meaning the amount of printed pages the cartridge will yield. Granted this is only an estimate. But you do not have anything better to use, so use this.

-- the cost of a ream of the paper used for printing.

Then compute:

(Black cartridge price / page yield)

+ ((Color cartridge price / page yield) x 3)

+ Paper cost

=======================

= Color printing cost per page

From
https://www.tonerbuzz.com/blog/printing-costs-how-to-accurately-calculate-your-printing-cost-per-page/

Forget about computing the cost of wear and tear on the machine.

Next, buy a proper copier for the office manager, or arrange to have a professional printer do this next year.

If I were on a Board, and knowing full well that my town has several professional printing services, I would not do this much printing on my personal printer on behalf of a HOA.

HenryS7 (Pennsylvania)
Posts: 336

Posted:

Thanks.

We were a bit behind on creating the election packet and the property manager needed it today and didn't seem to know how to have a commerical printer print it for us. I think our association is a little weird to ask for color pages instead of black and white (they have a high capacity black and white photocopier) but color looks so much nicer. We are willing to pay the extra cost for color.

With regards to my personal equipment, I happen to own a commerical grade Xerox color laser printer, so it doens't really put wear and tear on the machine. I just need to make sure I get reimbursed for my out of pocket expenses.

Your proposal is a good one. I'll run some calculations this evening and see if the total seems reasonable, and if so, work up a receipt.

SheliaH (Indiana)
Posts: 6,964

Posted:

Yes, you do need to be reimbursed, but rather than grabbing a number out of thin air, you might call a few places to see what the charge is for black and white copies, and color copies (which are usually twice as much). If you stapled all this, some places have charges for that, so throw that in as well. By calling a few places, you can work up an average cost per page, multiply by the number of pages and then go to your board like you should have done and they can vote on how much to pay you.

I'm not sure why you'd go off and do this without talking to your board first - even if you've said you're mostly a board of one. Spending association money is a decision that must be made by the entire board (even if they don't seem to care). This may seem like a small thing, but if you can't take care of the small stuff (because it DOES matter), what will happen if those small things grow up to become big things that spin out of control. You CHOSE to use your personal printer - are there no print shops in your area or even an office supply store where you could have had this done? At least you'd had a bonafide receipt to prove how much it cost you. If your property manager's office copier couldn't handle it either, you could have had him or her go to a print shop.

You really need to stop freelancing - and this "the board members don't care and won't do anything anyway" is getting old. If they're not doing their fair share of the work, you need to call them out on that. It may mean that if some things need to be done and another board member is responsible, but nothing gets done, then nothing gets done and he or she can explain why.

If it is not right do not do it; if it is not true do not say it. Marcus Aurelius

HenryS7 (Pennsylvania)
Posts: 336

Posted:

Quote:

Posted By SheliaH on 01/06/2022 3:24 PM
Yes, you do need to be reimbursed, but rather than grabbing a number out of thin air, you might call a few places to see what the charge is for black and white copies, and color copies (which are usually twice as much). If you stapled all this, some places have charges for that, so throw that in as well. By calling a few places, you can work up an average cost per page, multiply by the number of pages and then go to your board like you should have done and they can vote on how much to pay you.

I'm not sure why you'd go off and do this without talking to your board first - even if you've said you're mostly a board of one. Spending association money is a decision that must be made by the entire board (even if they don't seem to care). This may seem like a small thing, but if you can't take care of the small stuff (because it DOES matter), what will happen if those small things grow up to become big things that spin out of control. You CHOSE to use your personal printer - are there no print shops in your area or even an office supply store where you could have had this done? At least you'd had a bonafide receipt to prove how much it cost you. If your property manager's office copier couldn't handle it either, you could have had him or her go to a print shop.

You really need to stop freelancing - and this "the board members don't care and won't do anything anyway" is getting old. If they're not doing their fair share of the work, you need to call them out on that. It may mean that if some things need to be done and another board member is responsible, but nothing gets done, then nothing gets done and he or she can explain why.

The reason I printed it is because our property manager needed the document printed today and was not able to print it in-house for the board-approved cost of $0.25/page. We discussed the packet and the cost and approved it at our most recent meeting, however, we were not aware that our property manager didn't own the right equipment to print it. She offered to have Staples do it at a higher cost to the association, but I have the equipment and can do it for less so I went ahead and did it.

Now I just need to figure out how much to charge the association to be fairly reimbursed for my cost.

KellyM3 (North Carolina)
Posts: 2,239

Posted:

Quote:

Posted By HenryS7 on 01/06/2022 2:52 PM
We are in the process of sending out our election packet. It is 7 pages, double sided (so 4 physical pages). We have 274 homeowners. Due to limitations with the equipment of the property manager, I ended up using my personal printer to print out the election packet. It was a total of 1,096 physical pages with a page count of 1,918 color prints.

I clearly need to get reimbursed but have no idea how to fairly charge the association for this work. Professional companies would charge $0.25 per page, or about $500 for the print job. Our property manager would have charged us this rate if their printer would have handled the print job. I clearly didn't use up $500 of supplies, but I don't know much it cost me.

How much should I ask the association to pay for printing the election packet?

Have the HOA reimburse for the number of printer cartridges you burned through (including the one that was already in your printer) + however reams of paper it takes to create 1,100 pages. That's a great service you did and it was a lot of work.

This reimbursement is simple. You should not charge market rate for prints only be made whole on paper and ink costs, including having a fresh cartridge in your own printer when you're done. Easy.

SheliaH (Indiana)
Posts: 6,964

Posted:

When the board decided on the quarter per-page cost, was that for black and white copies only or did everyone assume this was sufficient without checking if it costs more to print in color? Color cartridges usually cost more than black and white, so that should have been everyone's first clue.

Y'all also need to have a serious conversation with your property manager. She had to know the packet would be 7 pages and some of them would be on color - why would she wait until TODAY to realize her copier couldn't do the job. It's nice that you stepped in, but if you were going to do that, you could have said something like "well, I have the equipment, but color ink costs more, so do you want ALL of this in black and white? If not, let's figure out how much the color pages will cost."

So...you could take Kelly's suggestion and factor in the cost of a color cartridge to pay for those pages - here's a formula I just Googled:

Cartridge price / Page yield + Paper cost = Cost Per Page

For the black and white pages, charge the 25 cents per page because that's what the board originally agreed to.

If it is not right do not do it; if it is not true do not say it. Marcus Aurelius

TimB4 (Tennessee)
Posts: 21,062

Posted:

Personally, I would have taken it to a copy center (or send it to one and pick it up on the way home from work). This way you would have had a receipt.

Ream of paper = 500 sheets.

So - two reams of paper and one set of ink should be enough.

I suspect you purchased the paper.
If not, go buy two reams so you have a receipt.
Go buy a set of ink cartridges so you have a receipt.

Next time, go to a copy center or office supply store (it will be less expensive then your PM)

BenA2 (Texas)
Posts: 1,273

Posted:

I would not charge the same as a for-profit professional. It would be unethical for you to profit from the printing. It is easy enough to calculate estimated costs. I would charge the current cost of paper and google the average cost of ink for your printer. You will probably get a range so I would go with the higher end since you also have wear and tear on the printer. I would ask the board to approve the reimbursement just to be totally transparent. That way it puts the decision on the board.

I agree with TimB4, in the future go to a copy center. Then, you have an actual receipt that no one will question.

CathyA3 (Ohio)
Posts: 6,299

Posted:

I agree with Tim. If I used my personal printer for anything, I ate the cost since there was no receipt to turn in. For large jobs I went to local print shop and got the receipt.

Board members have too much to do to waste time trying to justify costs for which there is no actual proof.

HenryS7 (Pennsylvania)
Posts: 336

Posted:

Just to close the loop, the property manager invited me to generate an invoice and send to the property manager, who will pay it. I decided that my cost is $0.10 per page, which is way cheaper than any commercial provider. In addition, I will also charge IRS mileage rate ($0.585 per mile) to cover my expense in driving the printed stack of paper to the property manager's office.

I think this is fair to the association while also being fair to me.

ND (PA)
Posts: 792

Posted:

Suggest next time directing your MC to the nearest copy center and let them deal with it. Astonishing that a MC doesn't already know how to do something like this. A quick phone call by the MC to the copy center will give them all the info needed to get the job done.

If the MC was smart, they'd probably realize that they can outsource stuff like this to a copy center, charge you guys whatever their contracted rate is for printing, and turn a profit for almost zero work.

You're overburdened with important HOA things. You don't need to be the HOA print service too.

KerryL1 (California)
Posts: 14,550

Posted:

Another next time have in your contract with the MC what they charges for dopy, etc. It's in our contract and I think it's typical.

KerryL1 (California)
Posts: 14,550

Posted:

Sorry, copying.

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