Hi - In my work I've come across a concept referred to as a "financial
delegation". The context I have seen it in is Australian Government
departments however I believe something similar would exist in private
enterprise.

As I understand this term it refers to the situation where an employee
is given the right to spend a certain amount of money on behalf of the
organisation they work for.

In the cases I've seen there is heirarchy of delegations where, for
instance, the CEO (or whatever the most senior executive is called) is
given a delegation by the Government minister (for private enterprise
purposes let's say the board).

The CEO in turn delgates spending responsibilty to senior managers who
delegate to less senior managers. This goes on all the way down to the
least senior level who has the power to spend money on behalf of the
organisation.

My question is this. If such a heirarchy of "power" is typically
implmented in private sector organisations what accountancy term(s)
is/are used to refer to this concept ? So for instance how does AT+T,
Ford, Coco-Cola refer to this distribution of spending power ? I
imagine there might be a number of terms. I'm just looking for
something that I can use as a starting point for further research.

Please ask for clarification if you feel the question is "asking the
wrong question" ! 

thanks

richard

Dear southof40-ga;

Thank you for allowing me an opportunity to answer your interesting
question. In order to answer it, I turned not to the corporate world
but mostly to governmental, public service and academic sites (which
are not only more abundant but more willing to publicly share their
internal policies than the mainstream money machines typically are):


A number of organizations and institutions refer to such an
arrangement as ?spending authority?

PERRPERDINE UNIVERSITY 
http://www.pepperdine.edu/finance/forms/pdf/form_spen_auth_req.pdf

CAPE BRETON REGIONAL MUNICIPALITY
http://www.cbrm.ns.ca/portal/civic/policies/ProcurementStatment.asp
(See Section 5 ? Spending Authority)


Some simply call the arrangement ?Delegation of Authority? or
?Signature Authorization?:

UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA SAN DIEGO
http://blink.ucsd.edu/Blink/External/Topics/Policy/0,1162,13906,00.html

OHIO STATE
http://www1.rf.ohio-state.edu/pag/sag06.cfm


Others call it ?fiscal authority? or ?delegation of fiscal authority?:

ORGEON HEALTH AND SCIENCE UNIVERSITY
http://www.ohsu.edu/policy/chapt_6/6-20-000.htm
(This one provides an EXCELLENTLY detailed explanation of exactly the
type of delegated authority you are referring to)

OREGON UNIVERSITY SYSTEM
http://www.ous.edu/cont-div/cobpp/05.10_delegationofauthority.html

CAL STATE
http://www.calstate.edu/eo/EO-648.pdf

UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA SANATA CRUZ
http://www2.ucsc.edu/judicial/handbook98-99/080_governments.htm#i_85.001
(Which also alternatively calls the power ?Low Value Purchasing
Authorization? or simply ?Purchasing Authorization? as seen here:
http://www.ucsc.edu/matman/purchasing/lvpa.htm


Still others (primarily in Europe is seems) like to refer to the
responsibility as ?delegation of budgetary control? or ?delegation of
powers?:

BRITON ROYAL INFIRMARY
http://www.bristol-inquiry.org.uk/final_report/annex_a/chapter_6_13.htm

NORTH SOMERSET
http://www.northsomerset.nhs.uk/publications/standingintro.htm


I also found a number of entities that call the arrangement
?purchasing delegation?, ?delegated purchasing? or ?delegation of
purchasing?:

NORTH CAROLINA STATE UNIVERSITY
http://www7.acs.ncsu.edu/materialsmgmt/purchasing/april20.htm

COMMUNITY COLLEGE OF DENVER
http://www.webcom.com/ccdadm/ahecsec1.html#SecIj


The process is also referred to by some entities as ?delegated
procurement? or ?delegation of procurement authority?:

UNIVERSITY OF KENTUCKY
http://www.uky.edu/Regs/BPM/B-3-2.html
(Also uses the term ?delegated purchasing?)

UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA
http://labs.ucop.edu/internet/sps/llnl/l_0102.pdf

Finally (and doubtful I?ve included them all since the titles appear
to be as varied as a thesaurus allows), are these less commonly used
terms:

WORKS (Hierarchy and approval matrix)
http://www.works.com/solution/payman_kc.html

CHOU DISSERTATION (Flattened Resource Allocation)
http://levine.sscnet.ucla.edu/archive/chou-dissertation.pdf

INDIANA UNIVERSITY SOUTHEAST (Authority to bid requisitions)
http://www.ius.edu/Campus-Services/purchasingpolicy.Htm

VIGINIA HOUSING DEVELOPMENT AUTHORITY (Delegated disbursement)
http://www.ius.edu/Campus-Services/purchasingpolicy.Htm



Below you will find that I have carefully defined my search strategy
for you in the event that you need to search for more information. By
following the same type of searches that I did you may be able to
enhance the research I have provided even further. I hope you find
that that my research exceeds your expectations. If you have any
questions about my research please post a clarification request prior
to rating the answer. Otherwise, I welcome your rating and your final
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future. Thank you for bringing your question to us.

Best regards;
Tutuzdad ? Google Answers Researcher


INFORMATION SOURCES

Defined above

SEARCH STRATEGY


SEARCH ENGINE USED:

Google ://www.google.com


SEARCH TERMS USED:


Search terms consist of the results found in each category:

SPENDING AUTHORITY

DELEGATION OF AUTHORITY

SIGNATURE AUTHORIZATION

FISCAL AUTHORITY

DELEGATION OF FISCAL AUTHORITY

PURCHASING AUTHORIZATION

DELEGATION OF BUDGETARY CONTROL

DELEGATION OF POWERS

PURCHASING DELEGATION

DELEGATED PURCHASING

DELEGATION OF PURCHASING

DELEGATED PROCUREMENT

DELEGATION OF PROCUREMENT AUTHORITY

HIERARCHY AND APPROVAL MATRIX

FLATTENED RESOURCE ALLOCATION

AUTHORITY TO BID REQUISITIONS

DELEGATED DISBURSEMENT

Very good indeed. A larger and more varied set of terms than I had
hoped for - thanks.

Peoplesoft and most ERP systems refer to this as "budgeting" and "procurement".

Budgeting allocates monies to progressively smaller parts of an
organization or project.
Procurement is the actual process of purchasing items and services.

http://www.peoplesoft.com/corp/en/products/line/scm/eprocurement/features.jsp
http://www.peoplesoft.com/corp/en/products/line/financials/budget/features.jsp

Hi wharton_emory_geek-ga - Thanks very much for this information,
that's exactly the sort of terminology I was after. I found the links
you offered for Peoplesoft very interesting as well.

thanks again.

richard.