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21
A surprising lack of imagination there Matt if you are asking "how can it be so hard".

What if your CFO left tomorrow, and it took 3 months to get someone else in post? What if the successor decided to start using some new accounting package? What if they then left after 6 months? What if someone outside the organisation started asking for reports on things you weren't previously tracking, like "what if we categorised this expenditure as X rather than y?"

Not to defend the BMC here as obviously they should be on top of their accounts and be exercising appropriate financial control, but it's not hard to see how an org can get itself in to an accounting mess.
Because any irregularities should have been spotted within weeks, if the Directors and CEO have their eyes on the ball, even if it’s just an hour a week. Frankly, our CFO works under the directors (which I admit is unusual) and only came into post a year ago, anyway. The group ran for 40 years without, but grew to a point where it became justified. Any changes would need to be agreed by us and the boss (that is all the directors of all the companies in the group, around nine of us, I have only met five of them and then socially, we don’t even have board meetings). My boss is the most humble Billionaire I’ve met, works hard and is damn sharp, but hardly superhuman. Shows up at 12 midday and buggers off at 6 and yet has all his ducks in a row. I’ve known him for 24 years now. No, every director has an up to date financial report for their bailiwick every week. We’d need to lose the entire accounting division before that point and everything would pretty much grind to a halt anyway. Losing the CEO, is a different matter. Nothing over 10k could move without him and that includes payroll… However, he’s training up two of his nephews (one of which is my CD. He has no kids himself). By training up, I mean has been using them as proxies. 16 years now for my friend.
I understand your point, but the BMC was supposed to be under  professional board control, with council oversight, correct? That’s a lot more than our group.
So, there doesn’t appear to have been any oversight.
Friendship or no, I would have been fired for that kind of crap, if it would have even been possible for me spend money without two other signatures.
We fuck up. Lose money, choose duff clients that stiff you on payments, have cost overruns that strip margins, blah blah blah, but we alway know how and why. In fact, we usually see it coming in time to cut losses, because we get weekly reports…

Edit: My point is, it isn’t justifiable. Or, at least, should not be. Nor has any adequate justification been presented. Or, to my knowledge, even an explanation of where the money went. To the stakeholders. The membership. WTF.
All I’ve seen is whitewashing and obfuscation.
22
A surprising lack of imagination there Matt if you are asking "how can it be so hard".

What if your CFO left tomorrow, and it took 3 months to get someone else in post? What if the successor decided to start using some new accounting package? What if they then left after 6 months? What if someone outside the organisation started asking for reports on things you weren't previously tracking, like "what if we categorised this expenditure as X rather than y?"

Not to defend the BMC here as obviously they should be on top of their accounts and be exercising appropriate financial control, but it's not hard to see how an org can get itself in to an accounting mess.
23
news / Re: significant repeats
« Last post by remus on Today at 03:02:36 pm »
Michael Piccolaruaz has made a solo ascent of a line called Ganja in Zillertal. I think there's some dodgy old bolts in it, but it sounds like it's typically done as a trad route at 8a/+ ish. Who knows what it'd get grade wise for a solo but pokey 8a crack sounds like a pretty hardcore solo to me.

https://www.instagram.com/p/C6tjSvLNEZU/
24
Ok.

Fuck it.

I’ve said similar to Pete, privately.

I’ve sniped, but I can make no direct accusation. There is simply no evidence and I have no knowledge of systems in place.
I don’t want to appear arrogant (or “financially incompetent”) either, but, as I said, Fuck it.

I simply do not understand how this situation arose.

I don’t understand, because I am a director of a large company.
I control a budget just under €100M. For context, I have spent €2.5M on paint alone over the last 12 months.
I don’t, of course, control this budget alone. There is a single accountant, under the group CFO. There is no fancy accounting package, they use Exel.
For any purchase under €10k, my signature, our Commercial Director’s signature and the CFO’s signature, are required on the offer/quote, LPO/PO, and all the invoices. We each keep a copy for our own files.
Above €10k, then the CEO replaces the CFO. That means, the CD and I physically take the documents to the CEO and justify the purchase, discuss alternative offers etc etc. This begins at the offer stage, long before any purchase order is generated.
Approximately every six months, the directors have to justify every employee’s position, to the CEO. We track hours and work orders, so it takes about an hour to put together the report. Nobody except the CEO has a secretary or assistant.
The group is internally audited twice per year.
We let the previous accountant go, for releasing a payment to a subcontractor that wasn’t due and without signatures. We discovered the missing money within seven days of the mistake, because we spend about an hour reviewing the previous week, on a Monday morning.
None of this aspect of my role is in the least bit arduous, tedious perhaps, but not actually hard. It is not at all within my educational background, I am an Engineer.
I can, however, “bring receipts” for everything we have done across all the various disciplines and departments I control with the CD at any time.

I am certain others posting here and on the other channel, also control substantial budgets and complicated work environments, alone or in part.
I want to point out as well, that we are a new company within the group, set up less than three years ago. We build large yachts (over 500 GRT) completely (steel/aluminium fabrication, design, fitting out, interior design etc etc), we are building a massive new shipyard (first shed will come on line within 3 months) and we are handling all aspects of the construction there too, no subcontractors. We have just completed the modules and fit out of a 900 room modular hotel for the Neom project (for four months I had 200 staff working in Saudi). There are just over 800 employees right now.

So, I just don’t understand how it can be hard to have kept track of the budget or how it is possible that that information is not retrievable. Or how the released info can be so woefully inadequate.

I of course bow to Tony’s superior financial nouse and freely admit my own incompetence.
25
get involved: access, environment, BMC / Re: 180k cragx Mill Bridge
« Last post by Dingdong on Today at 02:45:12 pm »
When the gas network in Stannington flooded destroying a number of my neighbours homes thanks to yorkshire waters incompetence, you can bet your ass I complained about them to Olivia Blake who was nothing but excellent. Sadly they have free reign to do what they want as long they pay measly fines.

Until the water companies are back under public ownership they'll continue to funnel money to their shareholders pockets instead of using that money to upgrade vital infrastructure.

The gas network was flooded because yorkshire water decided not to invest in pipes in the area despite numerous warnings and previous instances of pipes cracking and flooding areas of stannington.

This is not dissimilar to what's happening with the raw sewage discharges, these same bastards are keeping all of our money and using it to get richer whilst our waterways are filled with shite.
26
music, art and culture / Re: RIP
« Last post by teestub on Today at 02:39:58 pm »
Legend. I didn’t realise how many metal albums he’d produced before browsing his discogs https://www.discogs.com/artist/59373-Steve-Albini?superFilter=Production&creditFilter=Producer
27
get involved: access, environment, BMC / Re: 180k cragx Mill Bridge
« Last post by teestub on Today at 02:33:21 pm »
Don't mind me, just gonna periodically drop in here and leave articles proving that water companies such as Yorkshire Water are polluting our waterways and getting away with paying insignificant fines whilst paying their shareholders dividends.


Hopefully you’re writing to your MP with your concerns, as well as posting here
28
BMC accounting 2022:
1: Lift corner of rug.
2: Sweep it all under.
3: Deny massive lump under rug exists.
4: Claim rug is now too heavy to lift and “anyway, we put a new sofa on it now”.
5: Attempt Jedi mind trick “This is not the lump you are looking for”…
29
They are, I'll send you a message.
30
news / Re: The inevitable E grade thread
« Last post by jwi on Today at 01:22:43 pm »
I quite like the french use of obligatory ( 7b(6c+ obl) for that. Letting you know you can frig it 😁

The obligatory grade is amazingly useful to figure out how hard it is to get up a route. It is also pretty "compressed" in the higher grades. It is really really rare to find a route where it is harder than fr 7b between the bolts.
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