Grants:Programs/Wikimedia Community Fund/Amendment request

Amendment requests

This page summarizes the amendment request process for the General Support Fund.

Historically, requests for contract amendments were accommodated by the Wikimedia Foundation. These included:

1. Funding request above the General Support Fund approved grants for specific causes.
2. Transferring past underspending to a current ongoing grant’s budget.
3. Requests for extending a grant duration to change application rounds including request for additional funding to cover this period, or
4. Requests for extending a grant duration to have more time to implement the planned activities without requesting additional funding
5. Regional Fund Committees revisiting Round 1 decisions after Round 2, in case of remaining regional budgets, and adjusting the approved Round 1 budgets.
6. Multi-year grants with strategies Year 2 and Year 3 adjustments.

To increase the transparency of cases 1, 3, 5, and 6 above (i.e. where funding decisions are involved), an amendment must be communicated on the amended grant’s talk page on Meta-Wiki.

1. Requests for additional funding

For case 1: Funding requests above the General Support Fund approved grants for specific causes

Amendments should be about one-off costs and not regularly recurring costs. If a cost is recurring, that must be included in the main General Support Fund application.
Amendments should focus on direct costs that cannot be covered by the General Support Fund main application for some reason.
Amendments should not include FTE requests, unless it is a temporary contractor for a restricted period of time.
For multi-year grantees, an amendment will not be automatically renewed in all years of a multi-year grant’s duration.
The Regional Fund Committees have the decision autonomy to reject or approve fully or partially an amendment request.

Request process

1. Please visit the talk page of the ongoing grant that is to be amended.
2. Provide an explanation answering the following questions:

What is the amendment about?
Why is the amendment needed? Please provide links to further documentation for the Regional Fund Committees to review, if needed.
Why can't you cover it from the General Support Fund? Is anyone else already doing it or covering it, etc.?
What is the amount in local currency?
What is the timeframe of the implementation of the amendment?

Note: If an amendment request is about receiving support for external fundraising, it can include, e.g.:

Self-fund to participate in an approved external project.
Systems to improve member fee and donation management.
Study courses on fundraising.
Subscription fees to fundraising platforms.

3. Notify the Program Officers via email. They will notify the Regional Fund Committees for review. Regional Fund Committees might have further questions on the grant talk page.
5. Program Officers and Regional Fund Committees decide at the end of each application round. (2 times each year: October 30th, May 1st), decisions published to the grant talk page on Meta-Wiki.
6. Amendment is processed by Program Officers and Grant Administrators.

3. Requests to change the funding round

For case 3: Requests for extending a grant duration to change application rounds, including request for additional funding to cover this period:

1. Grantees must present (provide a link to) a work plan and a budget for this extension period on Meta-Wiki, on the grant talk page.
2. Program Officers and Regional Fund Committees review and approve the request at the end of each application round (2 times each year: October 30th, May 1st), decisions added to the grant talk page.
3. Amendment is processed by Program Officers and Grant Administrators.

5. Revisiting Round 1 decisions after Round 2

For case 5: Program Officers leave an updated approved amendment amount on the grant talk page at the end of Round 2.

6. Multi-year adjustments in year 2 or 3

Follow the Request process for case 1.