Normally at year end we take extra time to review our financial statements. It’s usually at that time that you notice if you have a lot of designated or donor-restricted funds. Do we have to track them in perpetuity or can we legally clean them up? I give you the four step process for cleaning up old designated funds.
It is surprising to me how many churches are trusting in their institutional memory when it comes to donor restrictions. If your church is doing this, there will be a day when someone challenges that memory. Do you have the donor restriction in writing? What if you lost the actual written donor restriction?
As ministry and church continues to change in order to meet new challenges of making disciples, some churches have pots of money with restrictions that are no longer relevant? What do you do? Can you change the restrictions? Yes, you do have some options to legally change those restrictions.
There are few things more satisfying for me than a beautiful spreadsheet. Thanks to Yankton First UMC, I have one more beautiful spreadsheet that I can share with you. Sharing is caring!
A church depends on designated giving to fulfill its mission. Should you then budget for it?
I’m still working in my 30-day free trial of Non-Profit QuickBooks Online. One of the first challenges I’ve helped churches work through is how you handle all those church funds. I’ve seen two good solutions: 1)Track it all in the Equity section or 2)Track it in Equity AND Other Income. I show you this in…
Are donor-restricted gifts a blessing or a curse? Often they are a blessing…especially when the church’s leadership is trying to raise money for a cause or project. A lot of churches take special offerings for specific missions (e.g. Mission of the Month). Others raise money for capital projects or to retire debt. But what about…