Booster Accounts
Fundraising and Financial Stewardship
We can help you fundraise for your team with a booster account combined with a customized fundraising page!
You can also receive reimbursements from your booster account within 48 hours of submitting your receipts!
- When a company or individual makes a donation to FIRST Washington and dedicates the funds to your team, the company is eligible for a tax benefit because FIRST Washington is a 501(c)3 charitable corporation. We will provide acknowledgement letters to your donors on request for tax deductibility. You can also find our W-9 with Tax ID here.
- We will include your team on our team donations webpage so that your donors can easily dedicate their donation to your booster account.
https://www.aplos.com/aws/give/FIRSTWashington/TeamDonations
- You can add a custom webpage to the FIRST Washington domain for your team with a donation feature, like this one for FTC 21336 in Vancouver, WA: https://secure.givelively.org/donate/washington-first-robotics/if-robotics. Typical set up time is 30 minutes for writing a few paragraphs about your team and uploading a photo! Learn how here.
- You can also mail checks from your donors to our office in Kent, Washington. As long as the check has your team number in the memo field, we will deposit it into your booster account.
Reimbursements*** from your booster account for team expenses are EASY.
***Please note: we are updating our expense policy overall but in the interim, expenses need to be in support of a FIRST Washington Robotics team and used solely for expenses that support FIRST Washington Robotics programs.
- We safeguard your team funds with easy access for reimbursement of your team expenses throughout the season.
- Reimbursements are easy using Expensify! No more checks to cash – we will transfer the funds directly to your bank account, your PayPal account or to Venmo.
- Multiple people on your team, like coaches, mentors, parents, and teachers may submit their receipts for reimbursement from your booster account, as long as you have a designated approver on your team. We do all the work and provide the reports. The system is automated and have we already said…. it’s EASY, FAST and EFFICIENT.
- To initiate a reimbursement request, email Boosters@firstwa.org. We will create your account in Expensify. After that, you will be completely self sufficient.
- What is reimbursable? Robot parts, participant travel expenses and meals, team registration fees, non-teacher coach stipends, general supplies, t-shirts, and many other team-related or competition-related expenses that are deemed necessary for your team.Examples of expenses that are not reimbursable are non-participant travel expenses (i.e., siblings of a team participant), legal / compliance fees, personal expenses, participant expenses that are not part of a team activity (i.e., summer camp, scholarships for non-FIRST programs).
Financial Reports
- We provide access to financial reports for your team at any time. We will either email your reports to you on request, or we will give you a user ID so that you can access your reports when you need them, 24 hours a day. Whichever method you prefer, email Boosters@firstwa.org with your request.
Setting up your booster account is easy.
Once your team is registered with FIRST Inspires, you will get a temporary team number like #2023001020. When you pay your registration fee you will receive your permanent team number (like #60020). You need the permanent number to set up your FIRST WA booster account.
To get started, email Boosters@firstwa.org and provide them with this information:
- Official team number
- Team name
- Name and email address for each person who is authorized to request expense reimbursement for team expenses. (You can add and remove people at any time.)
- Name and email address for one person who will approve all expense reimbursements. (The “approver” may also submit reimbursement requests, but will need an approver assigned.)
Reimbursements from your booster account are only granted to the extent that your team has funds in the booster account. So start fundraising as soon as possible. Either create your own webpage or share the team donation URL with all of your friends and family, as well as potential corporate sponsors. https://www.aplos.com/aws/give/FIRSTWashington/TeamDonations.