Ask HN: How does your company manage office supplies?

When I was working for the U.S. Census in 2000 one of the enumerators in my group got an idea where $20 of office supplies would save tens of hours for us.

Of course there was no procedure at all for getting reimbursed but since we were getting paid $12 an hour and the investment would easily pay off for our employer, that she should just say she worked another hour and a half and get the supplies. The supervisor (who was getting paid $14 and hour and working heavy overtime which he wasn't getting paid for) didn't have any argument, so she went out and did it.