What this document is
The Statutes define the association's structure and who holds which authority. This document holds the practical, day-to-day rules that need to change as the association learns: euro values, worked examples, procedures. The split is deliberate (proposed by Prashant, 12 Aug 2026): changing anything here needs a simple majority of the General Assembly (Statutes, Article 11f), whereas changing the Statutes needs a two-thirds majority and re-registration with the Registre d'Associacions.
This document may elaborate on, but never override, the Statutes. Where the two conflict, the Statutes win.
1. Payment authorisation values (Statutes, Article 26a)
The Statutes set who approves each band; this document sets the euro values:
| Band | Value | Approved by |
|---|---|---|
| Small | up to €10 | one Treasurer |
| Medium | over €10, up to €50 | one Treasurer and one Secretary |
| Large | over €50 | the President, one Treasurer, and one Secretary |
These are starting values (agreed as such, 12 Aug 2026); the Assembly revisits them once there is real experience of how often requests come up.
Approvals are recorded in the association's finance spreadsheet ("Keep Calm Barcelona" spreadsheet, Finance tab), which also tracks the per-activity split of the association's single bank account. The full request-to-payment process an Organiser follows is in the Budget Authority document, which will be folded into this document once the group has reviewed both.
Expenses and reimbursement
- Get approval before spending, through the bands above. Money spent without prior approval is not guaranteed reimbursement; the board decides those cases individually.
- No receipt, no reimbursement. A photo of the receipt sent to a Treasurer is fine; it is logged with the payment in the Finance tab.
- Reimbursements go through the same bands as any other payment.
Financial transparency
- The Treasurers share a short financial summary with all members at least once a quarter: balance, income and spending since the last summary, and the per-activity fund positions. A message in the members' group with the key numbers is enough; the point is that nobody has to ask to know.
- Any member may ask the Treasurers about any transaction and gets an answer within a reasonable time (Statutes, Article 6f gives the underlying right to consult the books).
2. Collecting money (Statutes, Article 24a)
Money may be collected on the association's behalf only through channels the board has approved. The approved channels are:
- Bank transfer directly to the association's bank account.
- Bizum to the association's account, once the association's bank supports it (support and fees vary by bank; to be confirmed when the account is opened).
- Cash at events, provided it is handed to a Treasurer and logged in the Finance tab within a week of collection.
- A board-approved payment platform (for example Stripe or SumUp), if and when the board adopts one.
Nobody outside these channels - including Organisers and board members acting alone - may collect money in the association's name.
3. Disciplinary examples (Statutes, Article 9)
The Statutes define three infraction levels; these examples illustrate them without limiting them:
- Minor: turning up to a session and repeatedly ignoring the Organiser's safety instructions; one-off disrespectful behaviour towards another participant.
- Serious: the same behaviour continuing after a warning; behaviour that drives another member out of an activity; misusing member contact details.
- Very serious: harassment or discrimination; violence or threats; fraud or misuse of association funds; any behaviour that puts others' safety at risk.
4. Mediation - practical detail (Statutes, Article 9a)
The Statutes set the four-step procedure. Practical points:
- The neutral board member should be agreed by both sides where possible; if they cannot agree, the President designates one (or, if the President is involved, the board does).
- Mediation is informal and aims for a resolution both sides accept; it is not a disciplinary procedure and produces no sanction. If mediation fails and the conduct may be an infraction, the Article 9 procedure applies separately.
5. Board role documents (Statutes, Articles 19-22)
The detailed role descriptions form part of these Internal Regulations by reference:
- President: duties and one-pager (
governance/roles/president/) - Secretary: duties and one-pager (
governance/roles/secretary/) - Treasurer: duties and one-pager (
governance/roles/treasurer/) - Vocal: duties and one-pager (
governance/roles/vocal/)
They elaborate on Statutes Articles 19-22 and cannot override them.
6. Use of the association's name (Statutes, Article 24a)
Acting, fundraising, or making commitments in the name of the association (or of Keep Calm) needs the board's authorisation. Organisers running a recognised working group's normal activities are considered authorised for that group's day-to-day operation, within the spending process above.
Removed 2 Sept 2026 (Daniel's explicit call): this section previously required board authorisation to create any Keep Calm-branded website, social media account, or messaging group, kept a channel register, and required the President/a designate to hold admin access to every channel - added 13 Aug after the Luca-Strava case, as a continuity safeguard. The association's authority under Article 24a is now limited to money and to commitments made in the association's own name; community websites, social accounts, and messaging groups are run entirely by the community and its Organisers, outside the board's authority.
7. Personal data and confidentiality (Statutes, Article 7e-f)
Collecting personal data
- Personal data (names, emails, phone numbers, addresses, and similar) is collected from members and participants only through channels the board has authorised: the official sign-up forms, the member register kept by the Secretaries, and the finance/subscription spreadsheet kept by the Treasurers.
- Nobody sets up their own form, list, or database of member details - not board members, not Organisers. If an activity needs to collect something new, ask the board first (same lightweight process as official channels in section 6).
- Collect the minimum the purpose actually needs. Data stays in the association's authorised systems: no personal copies, exports, or downloads of member lists. When someone leaves a role, their access is removed and any copies they hold are deleted.
Confidentiality
- Governance and board discussions are confidential by default. Nothing from them - messages, screenshots, forwards, quotes, or recordings - is shared outside the group without the board's authorisation or the consent of everyone involved.
- Members' and participants' personal details are never shared outside the association's own processes without that person's consent.
- Breaches are handled under the disciplinary regime (Statutes, Article 9); misusing member contact details is already listed among the serious examples in section 3.
- The community-facing rules on data, photos, and media are at keepcalm.fit/policies. This section governs how people inside the association's structures handle what they have access to.
Photos and media
- Photos and video from association activities are published only through the official channels (section 6), following the community's consent process: people are asked, not assumed, and anyone can opt out of appearing.
- Nobody publishes other participants' photos, or recognisable images of them, on personal or unofficial accounts without their consent.
- The full media and consent rules live at keepcalm.fit/policies; where those and this section differ, the stricter rule applies.
8. Conflicts of interest
- A board member with a personal interest in a matter before the board - their own spending request, an arrangement involving someone close to them, a dispute they are a party to - declares it and abstains from that decision.
- Requesting funds for an activity you organise is the normal process, not a conflict; the rule bites when the approver and the interested person are the same. In particular, a Treasurer never approves a payment they themselves requested: it goes to the other Treasurer or, failing that, up to the next approval band (section 1).
- The same applies to the President on a Large-band decision (Statutes, Article 26a): if the President is the interested party - for example, claiming reimbursement for costs they cover personally on the association's behalf, such as hosting or software subscriptions - they declare it and abstain, and the remaining Large-band authorisers (one Treasurer and one Secretary) approve without them. A recurring reimbursement of this kind is set up as a standing Large-band authorisation under Article 26a (recurring financial commitments), reviewed by the board at least annually, rather than re-approved every month - individual months are then logged as ordinary receipted expenses against that standing approval.
- Declared conflicts and the resulting abstentions are noted in the minutes.
9. Volunteers (Statutes, Article 22f)
The Statutes require a register of volunteers (llibre de voluntaris, article 313-3 of the Civil Code of Catalonia); this section sets the practical rules.
- Who counts: anyone with an ongoing unpaid role in running the association's activities - Organisers, bookers, moderators, and comparable recurring roles. Simply attending, or helping out once (carrying a net, taking photos), does not make someone a volunteer for register purposes.
- The register: kept by the Secretaries alongside the register of members, digital is fine. It records name, contact, role/tasks, and start and end dates. Someone leaving a role is marked as ended, not deleted (the register is a historical record).
- Onboarding and expectations: the existing role documents and onboarding packs (organiser guide, one-pagers, onboarding messages) are the volunteer rules for each role. Accepting a role includes accepting the association's data-protection, confidentiality, official-channels, and money-collection rules in sections 2, 6, and 7, whether or not the volunteer is a member.
- Expenses: volunteers are reimbursed for approved expenses through the normal process in section 1; volunteering itself is never paid.
Still to fold in (agreed direction, not yet done)
Prashant's proposal (12 Aug) was for this document to eventually absorb ALL the day-to-day documents rather than having 10 separate ones. Candidates, pending group review:
finances/budget-authority.md(the Organiser request process and per-activity fund tracking)- The four role duties / one-pager documents (currently referenced in section 5)
- Community conduct and safety rules (currently at keepcalm.fit/policies)