One missionary cost that I had forgotten about involved missionary transfers (or exchanges) from place to place. The church offered a limited transfer van (later it was equipped with a trailer to haul bikes/suitcases). The transfer van was planned by the AP's and it was their discretion as to who rode "free" with the transfer van. I only rode the van twice. Once for a 10 mile transfer and the final transfer (end of the mission) to meet/interview with the mission president.

Those who were going in the "wrong" direction always had to arrange their own travel and get familiar with "Gus" and his bus. You needed a good 50 bucks to ensure you had enough to ride the bus and there was always a 10 dollar freight charge to cover the baggage area taken up by your bicycle. Sometimes, missionaries were flat broke and the zone leader would have to argue with the mission office to assure that he would indeed be reimbursed for covering the cost of a bus ticket.

So after you arrived at your new area, you were supposed to write to the mission office to mail in your bus ticket as to receive your reimbursement. Some guys never bothered and ate the cost themselves. Some were careless and lost their receipt. In that case, you were reimbursed for a 5.00 ticket. Oh and that freight cost to ship your bicycle was on YOU. Some missionaries would leave their bicycles behind (sometimes bags/luggage too) and it would eventually ride the transfer van. If a missionary arrived without a bicycle, then pressure was placed on zone leaders/district leaders assigned mission vehicles to "loan" one of their bicycles. One guy was very particular about his bike and refused to loan out his 4,000K Cannondale bike. Missionaries used to buy their own bikes until they forced newbies to buy the "missionary package" which included a bike.

So back to the bus transfers. I was only reimbursed for two of them. One was honored at full value, but the most expensive one was challenged. The office elders claimed that I had bloated the cost because they had called the bus company and was quoted a cheaper price. Well duh, they called the wrong company. The church cheated me (and other missionaries) hundreds of dollars by the end of the mission.

My mission president served in Argentina in the 1950s. He genuinely believed that half of my mission's problems resulted from the church's equalization plan and that the monthly allotment of 125 bucks (the church/mission pocketed 225 to cover rent/utilities) was TOO MUCH. Of course, we were cheated out of that 125. First, the mission office claimed that they needed to withhold 5 dollars a month to cover bank charges (every missionary had a debit card to access a bank account). Why?

Because every missionary failed to maintain a minimum monthly balance of 250. Gee I wonder why when every missionary was being told to withdraw his/her entire allotment or get penalized 2 dollars a transaction on the sixth/seventh withdrawal (5 transaction were free).

Then there was the monthly tithing/fast offerings that we were coerced to pay to the ward/branch. We had to bring the pink or yellow slip to prove to our mission president that we were obedient. That was 12.50 back to the church every month.

Eventually our monthly allotment was increased to 135, but the mission president held out as long as he could. Old Ballard spilled the beans when he announced through a mandatory satellite broadcast that the church's stateside mission committee had approved a 10 dollar monthly increase 6 months ago. We never saw a dime and were not paid what we were owed.

4000 k is a pretty expensive bicycle.

I was fairly lucky during my mish, I don't recall traveling on 'the dog' at all.

Once I wanted to take the train for a transfer but was told I 'must' ride the bus instead but I don't remember how that one ended.


ChurchCo can afford cars for the mishs, but they'd loose a bit of control over their travels ('tourism trips') blah blah blah... and one Elder was killed in a car crash during mine... the car he was in didn't have a shoulder belt...

Do today's missionaries who have a car have $$$ costs deducted? When I was out, we had to pay to have one!

Do today's missionaries who have a car have $$$ costs deducted?

As a greenie, I was trained by a zone leader. That meant that 4 persons living in the same apartment received an extra 30 bucks in his monthly allotment. That means that 4 people were given 120 every month to keep the car gassed, washed and lubed. The two ZL's figured that having each greenie fill up the car, they never touched their own 30 dollar allotment for gas (and they flipped to see which one of them paid for a 5 dollar wash before zone conference). If you wanted to lose privilege for driving then you showed up in a mud-ridden car; it didn't matter if you were driving on the dusty industrial streets of Laredo :)

Forgot to add:


The mission vehicle was parked Tuesday through Friday. All missionary activities involved biking. Even if we had to go over to other missionaries' areas. (They saved their miles for unauthorized road trips).


A typical zone would consist of a set of zone leaders with a vehicle, a set of sisters with a vehicle and two sets of district leaders. Usually only one set of district leaders had a car. On average 3-4 sets of missionaries were car-less grunts. Their was usually a whining/pissing match between district leaders to see who would score the mission vehicle.

Despite my mission president's obvious chauvinistic-sexists views and behaviors, every set of sister missionaries were assigned a vehicle. He wanted them to feel safe.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/24/2020 12:51PM by messygoop.

Back in the day, in Mexico, we got our money from parents/whomever and we had to pay $X amount to the mission home to cover rent and the maid, and then we lived on whatever other funds we had. There were missionaries with very little spending money and there were missionaries with lots of spending money.

So now I understand the church is paid a monthly fee (which is labeled a religious donation and counts as a tax deduction, is that right?) and the church takes that money and puts $X into a debit card account and that's what the missionary lives on, in theory.

So what if a missionary's parents gave him a debit or credit card and told him/her that $100 a month was available on that card? Is that "legal"?

What if a non-member dad told his daughter, on the eve of her departure, "Sweetheart, here's Google's cheapest smartphone that will work pretty much anywhere. You can call or text me anytime you think you need to." Obviously a hardcore believer missionary would spurn the offer...

A doting parent would do pretty much anything to help, to protect his/her child. Which begs the question, "how come ghawd is always trying to cut corners and puts an organization ahead of his kids?

We payed the landlord monthly, bought our own food, payed for transfers that could be several hundred miles by train. This in a country where the only food I ever bought in a restaurant was a cup of pears that cost $4 in the 1970s. We lived like the poorest of the poor.

I was at the other end of the scale, just like ghawd planned, for both of us.

What a guy that ghawd is!

Back in the early 80s in my ward, one young woman proudly proclaimed during her missionary farewell that HF answered her prayers. She was thrilled to be going to Mexico because it was one of the cheapest missions to be sent to. Her family was worried of her being sent to Japan or England where the cost of living was considerably more expensive. This was before the church created an equalization plan to make missions more affordable for church members subsidizing their sons/daughters.

I'd forgotten all about transfers.

In Japan (89-91) we, as mishies, had to cover our own expenses 100%. When the transfer calls came, our first concern was "how far is it?" because that would dictate how much money would be spent. I had two or three long transfers and one that was so close I did it by Taxi.

One transfer I had a member that met me at the train station to send me off. She asked to see the ticket that I had just bought, she disappeared for a few minutes and came back and told me that I'd better hurry because my train was leaving soon. I said no, there's another 15 minutes and then she told me that she had upgraded me to Shinkansen Green Car.

No missionary had EVER transferred by Bullet Train First Class in the mission that anybody had ever heard of. When I got to my new area and stepped off the train in a flawless suit the mishies in the apt thought i was loaded and got super depressed until they found out i was as broke as everybody. Rich mishies sucked because typically they would indulge in fun stuff and the poor ones had to just watch.

I took the Shinkanzen for my last transfer from Shizuoka back to the mission home the night before I left Japan. What a thrill.

I did one transfer totally by bike. Took a couple of trips, but it wasn't but about 10 miles one way.

I think I only rode in a mission car once -- all other travel was by bike, bus, or train.

Yes, I remember transfers, too. I had a little trick.

We were limited to something like one suitcase and a bicycle box. Of course you put your bike that box, plus whatever small stuff you could fit in. Put them in the trailer and get in the van to drive across Texas.

I had an extra bicycle box and effectively doubled my space for all the junk I had. When I got to the transfer location to leave, I simply said it was "Elder Xxxxx's" box who was in the other area and was expecting it. They always let me put it on the trailer.

My last month, I literally has flour, sugar and oil that I made into a sweet tortilla. Had to save my food money to afford an expensive train ticket to the mission home. The train ride was 12 hours of travel. I was in the city farthest away from HQ. Brutal.