Membership audit 'Unrecorded marriage', how to fix?

After running a Membership audit this exception came out for one of our members. The person is married but not to a member. What is LCR wanting when saying 'Unrecorded marriage'?

In doing the audit, you've indicated that the member is married, and yet their membership record says they're single.

Even if they are married to a non-member, the marriage needs to be recorded. It can be a touchy situation to try and get the necessary information to record it, but that's what needs to be done.

So where is the system getting the data that the member is married? We got flagged for more than a dozen members - and when I look at their record, it shows no marriage (not that I can see - (member information page, family tab).

jtjacks wrote:So where is the system getting the data that the member is married? We got flagged for more than a dozen members - and when I look at their record, it shows no marriage (not that I can see - (member information page, family tab).

I haven't done a membership audit using the LCR version but in the old MLS system it presented a list of potential candidates (basically all singles of marriageable age) and the user checked those who are married (and need their records updated). The system itself did not determine who was married. I don't know any way the system could determine that someone was married but not recorded.

eblood66 wrote:

jtjacks wrote:So where is the system getting the data that the member is married? We got flagged for more than a dozen members - and when I look at their record, it shows no marriage (not that I can see - (member information page, family tab).

I haven't done a membership audit using the LCR version but in the old MLS system it presented a list of potential candidates (basically all singles of marriageable age) and the user checked those who are married (and need their records updated). The system itself did not determine who was married. I don't know any way the system could determine that someone was married but not recorded.

This is correct. The system isn't indicating that the member is married -- it is indicating that these are members who may potentially be married (unmarried adults) and asking you if there are any on that list who are married and the marriage hasn't been recorded.

No, I don't think it is correct.
In the audit, it is asking about the marriage status. I understand that . If the user checks the box that someone is married, the system is flagging somewhere that the person is married and it starts throwing exceptions because the system has recorded that marriage (somewhere - apparently invisible to the user) rather than asking the user who checked the box to supply the marriage info right then (so it could be recorded in the member's record) or confirming that the user will need to go get complete info (or something).

However, leaving aside the design issues, how do we fix the audit to stop the exceptions? I don't see any way to go back and correct the audit (I can't even see a way to view the last audit).

jtjacks wrote:However, leaving aside the design issues, how do we fix the audit to stop the exceptions? I don't see any way to go back and correct the audit (I can't even see a way to view the last audit).

If I understand you correctly, you're saying that during your last membership audit, you checked the box on the marriage step for some members who are not actually married. Is that correct? If that is the case, there isn't anything you do to "fix" the audit. It has been submitted, although some of the data was incorrect.

You can submit a new membership audit (and you have started one) if you want with the correct data. It isn't necessary, but you can do it if you want to submit a new audit without the incorrect exceptions.

The fact that the members were marked on the last audit is not recorded anywhere other than the audit itself. That does not carry over to the next audit. If you look at the marriage step on the audit you started, you will see that none of the members marked as married in the last audit are marked as married in this audit.

You can view the last audit by clicking the link that says "View last audit submitted 23 Jun 2016" on the audit overview step.

I think that is what the system now thinks. I don't think we checked the boxes incorrectly. When the membership clerk did the audit, I don't recall seeing any exceptions noted when I reviewed it before submission. Now it is showing a long list of exceptions. No idea how that came about.

However, the marriages (and related exceptions) recorded in the audit are apparently driving some kind of issue reporting because it has flagged inquiries from our stake clerk. If the only way to fix it is to submit a completely new audit, I guess we can do that - just seems like a lot of work for a data error.

Somebody checked the box for those members on the last audit. That is the only way for them to end up in that state. Marking records during the audit does not modify the membership record and it affect subsequent audits.

Your stake clerk has probably inquired because he looked at his record-keeping status report and it shows that your ward has 17 unresolved audit exceptions from the last audit. Under normal circumstances, membership audit exceptions should be resolved within 30 days. It has now been almost 90 days since you submitted your audit, so it is reasonable for him to ask about the unresolved exceptions.

You don't necessarily have to submit a new audit. Talk with your stake clerk and let him know the situation. Knowing what the situation is, he may say to just leave it as is. If he wants to see the exceptions cleared, he might ask you to submit another audit.

There is a sister in our ward, 50 years of age, that has never married. The Ward Audit is kicking out an error of "Unrecorded Marriage" for her. I'm new to the membership calling so I don't know if there is an error in the records somewhere or does the program put out this error automatically for folks over a certain age? Is there a way to correct the records so this error doesn't keep reappearing?

Thanks to all for the help you've given me these past few months.

Dennis

dennisorvaldavis wrote:I'm new to the membership calling so I don't know if there is an error in the records somewhere or does the program put out this error automatically for folks over a certain age?

I've merged your post with an existing thread of the subject. It seems to be causing some confusion for several clerks.

Hi Dennis,

Look at her record - family tab. If (a) it doesn't show a marriage, and (b) nobody in leadership told you she is actually married (as part of the membership audit), it is probably just a mistake in the audit.
There is a step in the audit where you are presented with a list of people for whom the system has no marriage information, and you are asked to "check the box" for people who are actually married, but whose records don't show the marriage. If you check that box, then the system will show it as an exception and start nagging you to get the marriage information.

If that box was checked in error for your member during the audit, SLC won't fix it in the current audit and the system will hound you to record her marriage information. In other words, if you checked the box in error, or if the error crept in some other way (data errors) SLC says they won't change the audit, even if it is wrong. SLC says the only way to fix it is to submit a complete new audit. Note that you can also just choose to ignore the exception and system nagging and do nothing about it (and let your ward and stake clerks know that you are doing so). Then enter it correctly next time you do an audit (you can actually do a membership audit at any time - you don't have to wait for the deadline).

Also note that if you checked the box (not in error) but have no practical way to get the marriage information (unfortunately common with some less active members), the system will basically hound you forever (or until you stop checking the box in each year's audit or actually get the marriage information). Makes me wonder why anyone would ever check that box. If you had the marriage information at hand, you would just record the marriage. If you didn't have the marriage information, you would just be setting up an error to nag you forever.

JTJ, Thank you for the reply. I dug a little deeper and found that her husband (deceased) is listed plus a date of marriage. She is not active and has joined another sect so information will be difficult to obtain. Three sons carry the last name of the deceased father. I'm told that there is a fourth child with a different last name. As I mentioned, I'm new to this calling, but I feel that this audit error has been there for many years.

You said that an audit can be done at any time. Can an audit be done without the results being sent to SLC? I'd love to have an audit worksheet that shows what errors I can work on before the next official audit is submitted.

Sorry for the delay i responding.
If nobody has been "checking the box" for the sister you mentioned, then it would seem that there has been an audit issue for a while, it just hasn't been tracked in the system.

Personally, I am seriously considering not "checking the box" for any members where we suspect they are married, but we don't think we will be able to get complete information about the marriage in a reasonable time. All "checking the box" will do is create an audit exception, which we will have no practical way to clear. Last thing we need is an automated nag to raise issues with the stake, etc. Instead, I think I will create a paper tracking list and review it with our PEC periodically. If we can get marriage information, I will enter it. Until we have the information, the issue won't be flagged as an ongoing exception to waste the time of our leaders.

It is really disappointing that the system developers can't be more helpful with the tool design so that we could use it to help track issues instead of making them big red errors we would have to spend too much time trying to explain again and again. I guess it is just another example of "things you have to do to manage your calling despite the systems."

To answer your question - yes, you can start an audit and not submit it to SLC. Until you click the button to submit the audit to SLC, you can use it as a local tool. Unfortunately, it is the only way I know to get at some of the information the audit generates. If SLC looks (which they likely won't), they will see that you have started an audit, but they won't really care about it.