Donations from ward fund raisers

I am a stake auditor and have noticed that because wards find it difficult to define other subcategory accounts for specific purposes, they are placing donations from fund raising directly into the YM/YW bugets. Is this acceptable?

I have read and understand Church policy regarding fund raising and activities, but wards do receive and feel they need donations for YM/YW activities.

dsphipp wrote:I am a stake auditor and have noticed that because wards find it difficult to define other subcategory accounts for specific purposes,

Unless something has changed, it should be very easy to create a sub-account under "Authorized Member-Funded Activity" section of "Other". That's where the donations should go. It sounds like a training issue.

dsphipp wrote:I have read and understand Church policy regarding fund raising and activities, but wards do receive and feel they need donations for YM/YW activities.

Just to be clear, what's authorized is fund raising for a very specific annual activity - not "YM/YW activities" in general. The latter would be major violation of Handbook 2: 13.2.8

dsphipp wrote:they are placing donations from fund raising directly into the YM/YW bugets. Is this acceptable?

Disclaimer: Despite my title of "head janitor" of the forum, I'm not an authority figure. This is all my understanding of the policy. Please refer to the appropriate manuals and training materials for confirmation.

Let's go back to principles: As outlined, all the donations have to go to the authorized activity. It cannot be used to subsidize the general YM/YW fund or any other budget category. Your job as an auditor is to verify that. If everything is commingled into one "pot" that's going to make your job a lot harder. You'd have to add up all the expenses of the activity and all of the donations to make sure the expenses match or exceed the donations. It makes your job harder and it makes it harder for the ward to keep track.

What should be happening is all the donations goes into a sub-account of "Authorized Member-Funded Activity" (commonly just called "Other"). The checks for the annual activity are written off that account. Funds can be transferred from budget to "Other" to help out (or alternatively, checks written can be split between the accounts). Any excess needs to be dealt with according to policy - which does NOT include simply rolling it into any budget accounts. If it's not spent for the intended purpose, and cannot be refunded, then it needs to be sent to CHQ. The whole idea (in my opinion) about the "other" account is to keep funds separated so everything is transparent and understood by all.

There are various tricks that can be done with re-categorizing things after the fact. (Such as writing a deposit check against budget and then when sufficient donations have come in, re-categorizing it as "other".) But, the end result should be a clean "All donations go into 'other', all expenses written against 'other' was for the annual event". That makes it easy for the ward to follow policy and for an auditor to confirm compliance.

There are very few situations when you would ever record a "donation" to a budget category:
- Redeposit unspent advance.
- Redeposit overpayment for an expense.
- Deposit transfer checks from another unit (although these are normally Other:AMFA expenses).

drepouille wrote: - Deposit transfer checks from another unit (although these are normally Other:AMFA expenses).

These will often go to budget when there are boundary changes as the stake or wards involved have to shift budget around. But outside of that I would agree that Other is a more likely target.

If we would all remember that a "fund raiser" is not a donation, it would be easier. In my simple mind:

1. Donations are given freely to an organization with no control over how the donation will be used and with no tangible benefit received. Example: Tithing
2. Fund raisers are normally payment for goods or services for a specific purpose and there is a tangible benefit (the goods or services we receive from participating in the fund raiser), even if the benefit is much lower than the amount paid. Example: Silent auction to raise scout camp funds where I purchase a dozen donated cookies for $20.00.

I struggle to get this message through to our ward council every time we begin planning a YM and YW camp fundraiser...

As was mentioned above, it is easy to create new sub-accounts in the 'Other' account. Each year we create a new account for the fundraiser for Scout camp and Girls camp. Each a separate account. If there is one fund raiser, the money is split between the two accounts on a ratio agreed upon by the Presidents of both of the organizations. Any money left over is left in that account, and is put towards the next years activity. That has worked well for us for a number of years.

We've started having youth fundraisers (for various reasons) and wonder generally how others record the income. Do you associate direct donations (not tied to a meal, item, or service) with individuals or as lump sum 'fundraiser income'? Do you associate income from items or services (e.g., dinners, silent auctions, national flag set-up service) with individuals or as lump sum 'fundraiser income'?

Reasoning for choices would also be appreciated.

Any donation should be recorded in the name of the individual who donates. So if you decide to have a dinner as your one annual fundraiser (see Handbook), and 50 members donate, you have 50 contributions to record.

If you receive income for a project, such as if a city pays for a flag service, you have one donation from the city. The individuals who provided the service do not receive the donation themselves. The city donated and receives credit for the donation.

Tying income to youth who collect it is not an option for us, and associating direct donations certainly makes sense. I guess I'm wondering about monies when we don't know who the person or persons are. As examples, dinner attendees pay cash 'at the door' and notes of who they were are lacking, or cookies are available during a dinner for additional cost and notes of who paid are lacking.

If you do not know who donated it, it is from an unknown donor, and that is the way you record it. In the event any of the funds need to be returned, you would send the unknown donations to Church headquarters at the same time.

Personally, I would so much be waving the Handbook around in ward council at this point, but I understand there are circumstances where that will not work, and you support your leaders as best you are able.

Yep. My plans include consolidating instruction and information on fundraisers to share with current and future leaders, and I need perspective to do so. This thread and another on fundraisers have significantly shortened my education. Thanks to all who participate in this forum.

jpjones~ogr wrote:As examples, dinner attendees pay cash 'at the door' and notes of who they were are lacking, or cookies are available during a dinner for additional cost and notes of who paid are lacking.

We encourage our youth leaders to provide donation envelopes and slips at the door, ask attendees to place their payment in the envelope and then give them to a member of the bishopric (which means making sure a member of the bishopric is easily available--perhaps at the door). It's somewhat more complicated then just taking money directly but it follows the money handling policies of the church.

Of course, if the donor doesn't fill out the slip we don't know who it was so we record it as Anonymous.

And please ask donors to make checks payable to the ward or the church.

We have a YM/YW activity coming up this summer where the majority of the expenses will come out of the budget. But members will need to pay a small portion of the cost. I understand the process involved for fund raising, etc. The one question I haven't been able to answer from the handbook concerns refunds. If a family paid their portion (say $50) for their child to participate but the child is unable to go, can they have their $50 refunded from the activity's subcategory that was created for money collected?

bwmurphy wrote: Sun Jan 28, 2024 11:53 am If a family paid their portion (say $50) for their child to participate but the child is unable to go, can they have their $50 refunded from the activity's subcategory that was created for money collected?

I haven't seen anything that addresses that either way. However, that was the documented practice when money was handled in the AMFA categories. Since the payments to budget aren't tax-deductible and aren't considered 'donations' but payments, I assume you should refund as was done previously.

But if you want to make sure, you should contact the global service department.