A “NECESSITY” is what it takes to make products and valuable final products. (Ref: HCO PL 13 Feb. 71R, FINANCIAL PLANNING TIPS, Finance Series 2R.)

A divisional secretary is responsible for seeing that the necessities of his division are provided for in financial planning. This responsibility extends to follow-up of approved items to ensure that they are purchased by Division 3 and delivered in good order.

For the Treasury Secretary this duty extends to the necessities of the entire org.

Too often, FP troubles trace on investigation to one or more of the following:

1. The item in question was never proposed to any FP Committee.

2. The item was returned for better CSW and never reappeared.

3. The item was refused by an FP body but never appealed — either to the FP body or the FBO.

4. The FBO saw the item safely through FP months ago but it was never bought or the money was otherwise (without authorization) used.

In order that the FBO can ensure that existing policies on the above are followed, an appeal line is hereby established.

The appeal line is direct to the FBO. Any staff member may use it.

It concerns the use of the org’s allocation — not the amount.

It is used whenever a vital necessity is denied in FP.

It is used when an FP-approved item is stalled on purchasing lines.

It may be used in any case where usual lines have failed to remedy a nonoptimum situation concerning the approval or purchase of necessities.

Any staff member may appeal to the Cont FBO or even the FBO Int if not handled to the satisfaction of the staff member at org level but in such cases must include the result of the appeal to the org FBO.

Any report of such situations received at Cont or Int level without first having been appealed to the org FBO shall be considered incomplete and will be returned without further handling.

Where the appeal concerns delayed implementation of a Flag or higher level issue or order, a copy of the appeal must be sent direct to the Flag Rep at the FOLO and to the Org Pgms Chief at FOLO as well as to the Int Finance Ethics Officer located at Flag.

The usual FBO action would be

1. To get the situation HANDLED terminatedly and reported to the Cont FBO at once with info copies of the report sent to FOLO and Flag Data Files for that org.

2. To get the related policy letters or other issues checked out on all concerned.

3. To require of the Dir I&R an investigation of the matter to determine the source of the situation and any out-ethics found handled; and failing that, the FBO, or Finance Enforcement Officer where posted, must personally investigate the matter and handle TERMINATEDLY. The results of any such investigation must be reported to the Int Finance Ethics Officer with copies to Flag and FOLO Pgms Chiefs.

One of the FBO’s statistics is the ALLOCATION-PRODUCTION ratio of the org.

If his allocation buys VFPs, he can expect a rising allocation-production ratio statistic. Normally, this is assured by the use of an allocation system which allocates against VFPs.

However, if the org and divisional necessities are denied or neglected outside his view, he may find allocation-production crashed weeks or months later.

Also, too often FP and Finance are given a bad name in connection with situations actually tracing to 1, 2, 3 or 4 above.

Finally, this policy letter gives staff members a line of recourse and final appeal in the event that it is needed to ensure the continued and high volume production of valuable final products of their divisions and the org.

No staff member may be made the subject of an ethics or justice action for making an appeal which conforms with this policy letter. However, not making an appeal when it results in lessened production in an org would result in ethics or justice actions being taken against the staff member.