Budget & Travel Itinerary - Marketing Grant: Micro Stream

Use this scribe to help you complete your budget and travel itinerary for the Micro Stream of the Marketing Grant Budget Tips: - Use the official template for the current fiscal year - Include only eligible costs - Use actual prices and currency conversion if needed Itinerary Tips: - Use it to calculate fees for hired staff - List each day of travel and event participation with their expenses

Sharepoint

Navigate to <https://creativesask.smartsimple.ca/>

Once logged into GMS, go to the top left part of the screen to and click on “Templates & Additional Materials”

Then click “Marketing Grant”

Then click “Application Templates”

From there, download the budget for the current fiscal year

Templates are updated annually, so ensure that you are working with the most up-to-date version of the template that is available

If you don’t use the template provided by Creative Saskatchewan, your application will not be accepted

Ensure the expenses you intend on putting into the budget template are eligible - Eligible and ineligible expenses are outlined in both the [Creative Saskatchewan General Program Guidelines](https://www.creativesask.ca/general-program-guidelines/) and [Marketing Grant Guidelines](https://www.creativesask.ca/marketing-grant-guidelines/) - Any questions can be directed to a [Program Advisor](https://www.creativesask.ca/about/#programs)

*If ineligible expenses exceed 50% of the total project budget, the whole application will be deemed ineligible*

Be sure to read the [Creative Saskatchewan Applicant Travel Policy](https://www.creativesask.ca/travel-policy/) found under “Resources”

**Prepare Your Plan and Expenses** - Summarize your project plans and begin gathering what you will need to complete the Budget and Travel Itinerary for your application. - Organize your Budget Line Support Documentation for all line items $500 and over. - NOTE: If support documentation has not been provided for more than 50% of line items $500 or more, the application will be deemed ineligible. - Examples of budget line support documentation include:\ o Estimates or invoices from vendors and service providers\ o Calculated breakdown of applicant/staff labour (# of hrs x rate = total)\ o An email, text message, price list, or website screenshot from the vendor or service provider confirming their rate

Remove GST/HST from your expenses as it is an ineligible expense. (PST and all other taxes can be included, just not the Canadian federal sales tax)

All amounts must be in Canadian Dollars. For international amounts, use the “Exchange Rates” tab. To get the correct international rate, use the [Currency Converter - Bank of Canada](https://www.bankofcanada.ca/rates/exchange/currency-converter/) found in the [Creative Saskatchewan Applicant Travel Policy](https://www.creativesask.ca/travel-policy/). Demonstrate the exchange rate calculation in the budget line column “Expense Calculation”. (Ex: $1.00USD x 0.7294 (exchange rate per July 15, 2025) = $0.7294 CDN)

If travel is part of your project, you would first start by completing the Travel Itinerary tab, which automatically populates some of the travel expenses in the budget.\ \ Select either the “Travel Itin Same Travellers” or “Travel Itin Diff Travels” tabs and fill in the necessary fields using your Travel Plan As this example is for 2 people travelling together at the same time, open the "Travel_Itin_Same_Travellers" tab

If your project entails more than one person and you will be travelling different days than them, you would fill out the "Travel_Itin_Diff_Travellers" tab

If hiring staff for the event, calculate their fees. Start by entering their name

Then their role

The number of events

And the rate you are paying them per event

The total fees for that person are then calculated automatically. Continue as needed

The total for Hired Personnel Fees will then be calculated and automatically populated in the Budget

Next, list the Saskatchewan residents travelling to the event. Start with their name

And then their position. Continue as needed

Scroll down to the rest of the itinerary Begin with the first date

Using the drop-down menu, select what you will be doing that day - Travel - Performance - Sale - Press - Day Off

Enter the Country you will be in

Then the City/Town you are departing from

If driving your personal vehicle at all, enter the kilometers. You can use google maps (or a similar program) to determine the kilometers. The mileage rate is then calculated based on the current Government of Saskatchewan approved rate

If renting a vehicle and buying fuel, do not use the kilometers travelled column, those amounts are to be entered in the "Cost of Other Travel" column

If you are flying, the next step would be entering the airfare for that leg of the trip

If it's a round-trip flight, divide it by 2 (after removing any GST and HST expenses)

Then enter the cost for "Other Travel" such as train, ferries, and other modes like tolls, subways, buses, and taxis/ubers. Larger trips (like a train or long bus ride) should be determined with estimated screenshots or booking receipts. \ \ In this example, they will be using long-term parking at the airport, and taking a taxi to/from the airport and hotel on travel days.

Then enter the nightly rate for the accommodations

If traveling abroad, look up the exchange rate at[Currency Converter - Bank of Canada](https://www.bankofcanada.ca/rates/exchange/currency-converter/) and enter it in the "Exchange Rate" column here

Then select the daily Per Diem rate. As all travel is in Canada for this trip, the exchange rate will remain at 1 and the rate of $130.80 will be used for work and travel days

"0" should be selected as the per diem rate for days off

And enter the rate into the "Daily Per Diem Rate in CAD" column. You can also hit "enter" and the CAD rate will be automatically populated

Continue to complete each day of travel

When finished, enter the number of Saskatchewan people travelling so the total amount for Per Diems will be calculated. The Travel Itinerary is now complete!

Next, open the "Budget" tab

As you can see, many of the travel amounts have been auto-populated from the Travel Itinerary. The only travel remaining is to be entered for this example is: - Rental Vehicles - Rental Vehicle Fuel

Then it's a matter of entering any other eligible expenses you expect to incur for the project, such as: - Promotional Materials Expenses - Media and Publicity - Website and Social Media

For each Budget Line Item, enter in the description in the "Expense" column

And then the "Expense Calculation". This is a great way to demonstrate how you determined the "Budgeted Amount" such as an expense with GST/HST to be removed or an hourly calculation

Then enter the total amount for the Budget Line Item in the "Budgeted Amount" column

If a Budget Line Item amount is to be spent “In-House” and/or in the Province of Saskatchewan, also enter the amount in that column(s)

The “Sask Spend” amount indicates the amount of the budget item that will be spent in the Province of Saskatchewan

If any of the expenses are In-House (money spent within your own business, organization, or group), the amount will also have to be entered into the "In-House Spend" column. An example of In-House activities would be editing, design and layout within the company by salaried staff

Continue adding Budget Line Items until all your expenses have been entered

Then click on the "Grand Total" amount. The expense portion of the Budget is now complete!\ \ You can see that the Admin Fee has automatically been added to the SubTotal. \ \ In this example 15% of the total expenses was used as the Admin Fee amount, as it is less than $5,000.00. If 15% of the total expenses is more than $5,000.00, the maximum of $5,000.00 would have been added to the SubTotal

The Admin Fee is to re-imburse you for your time administering the grant from application through to reporting if approved, as well as the project itself. This money can be paid to yourself or the applicant company, or to a third-party if you so choose

The “Amount Requested from Creative Saskatchewan” has been auto-populated to the maximum eligible amount, either: - 50% of the Grand Total OR - The maximum eligible amount for the grant In this example, 50% of the Grand Total is more than $5,000.00 (the maximum eligible amount for the Micro Marketing grant), so the amount of $5,000.00 has been auto-populated

Next is the "Project Financing" structure which outlines how the project will be paid for. The "Amount Requested from Creative Saskatchewan" has been auto-populated into the Project Financing structure, so if you are requesting a lower amount, you'll need to adjust both cells accordingly

In this example the applicant is contributing the remaining financing so enter in the name, and amount. And be sure to select "Confirmed"

Incomplete project financing will result in the application being deemed ineligible

The "Total Financing" should match the "Grand Total" of the budget

The last step is completing the "Revenue Projections". If you have any, enter in the source, the low estimate(s) and the high estimate(s)

The Investment Summary is then auto-populated with the amounts based on the Total Expenses and the Revenue Projections

Ta-Da! You're now finished! - Save the file in Excel or as a PDF - they are the 2 accepted file types. All other formats are not accepted - Upload the completed Budget and Travel Itinerary in the “Upload” tab of your application within GMS - Use the totals in the correlating fields of the “Project Summary” tab