Reimbursement

Your education fund may already cover this.

Plenty of residency and fellowship programs give trainees an annual sum for educational materials, and plenty of trainees never spend it. Capnolog is educational software built around a training requirement, which is the kind of thing those funds are usually written for — but every program writes its own policy, so the answer for yours comes from your program, not from us.

Capnolog costs nothing today. It is in a private beta, Premium is free while the beta lasts, and there is no purchase to put on a reimbursement form. This page is here for when you upgrade.

The fund goes by a dozen names

Book fund. Educational allowance. Education stipend. Professional development fund. CME or conference allowance. Discretionary fund. Same idea under different words: a yearly amount the program sets aside for things that help you train, claimed by handing in a receipt.

Not every program has one, the amount varies, and what counts as an eligible expense varies more. Some funds name software outright; some list only books, board review and conference travel; some leave it to the coordinator. Your GME office or your program coordinator has the actual policy — that is the person to ask, and asking costs nothing.

What Capnolog is, in the words a form asks for

Educational software for a training requirement. Capnolog is built around the ACGME case log: capturing cases in seconds, showing you what your own record counts toward each published minimum, and helping you prepare what you submit. It is used across the training years, on your own device, for your own record.

That description is ours, and it is accurate. Whether it matches your fund's list of eligible expenses is a question only your program can answer, and we would rather you ask first than be told no afterward.

How it works

Three steps, once there is something to buy.

Step 1
Buy it in the app
There is nothing to buy yet — Premium is free during the private beta, and the in-app purchase is not built yet. When it arrives, Premium will be bought inside the iPhone app, so the transaction runs through the App Store on your Apple account.
Step 2
Generate the receipt
In development
In the app, Settings → Get reimbursed will produce a one-page PDF for you. It is a companion to the confirmation Apple emails you after an App Store purchase, not a replacement for it — Apple's message is the proof of payment, and the PDF is the same purchase written out the way an expense form asks for it.
Step 3
Send both to your coordinator
Hand in the PDF together with Apple's emailed receipt, and say what the software is for. Two documents answer the two questions a reimbursement form asks — what was bought, and that it was paid for.

The document

What is on the receipt

The fields an expense form asks for, on one page, beside Apple’s own emailed confirmation rather than instead of it.

Seller. Apple, which is the merchant of record on an App Store purchase, with Capnolog named as the product.
Product. The app and the exact tier bought, described as educational software rather than as a line-item code.
Date. The date of the purchase.
Amount. What was charged, in the currency your Apple account was billed in.
Transaction reference. The identifier that ties the PDF to the purchase, so the two documents can be matched.
Purchaser. You. A receipt covers one purchase by one person; there is nothing on it that transfers.

Questions we get

Is this educational software?: Yes. Capnolog exists to serve a training requirement: the ACGME case log, the published minimums for your specialty, and the record you carry through residency. It is not a game, a productivity subscription, or a consumer app with an education label pasted on.
Who is the seller on the receipt?: Apple. Buying inside an iPhone app is an App Store purchase, so Apple is the merchant of record and bills your Apple account; Capnolog is named as the product. If a form has one box for the vendor, Apple goes in it, and the app name goes in the description.
What does it cost?: Logging and export are free and stay free. Premium is free during the beta and its launch pricing has not been announced, so there is no figure to put on a form today.
Can my co-resident use my receipt?: No. A receipt covers one purchase by one person, and reimbursement is claimed by the person who paid. If two of you want it, two of you buy it, and each of you gets your own receipt.
Will my program reimburse it?: We cannot tell you that, and nobody who is not your coordinator can. Programs write their own policies, funds differ in size and in what they cover, and some have no software line at all. Ask before you buy: a two-line email to your program coordinator is the whole process.

Ask first. It is a short email.

Something close to: “Does our education fund cover educational software? I am looking at a case-logging app for my ACGME record and can send a receipt.” That is usually the entire conversation.

See what is free and what is not Ask us a question