What to do when two members of the church get married

This post was last updated on March 24th, 2021 at 12:37 pm.

You know how to add a new member into IconCMO. But what happens when two members of the church get married? You already have both of them in your membership database, so you need to merge the two records together. And what happens if they’ve given contributions?

Here’s an example

Let’s say John Anderson and Mary Smith got married on July 1st. Both of them gave contributions prior to being married. In this case, you will need to transfer the donations and print 3 separate contribution statements: one for each of them before they were married and one for their joint giving. You will also need to determine which household you wish to keep. For this example we will keep the John Anderson household and move the member record for Mary Smith to the John Anderson Household.

First, let’s transfer the contributions

1. Go to Contributions → Envelopes → Env-Maintenance → Add/Edit Member #’s and enter a zero next to Mary Smith and John Anderson. You must do this in order to transfer the contributions or you won’t see their names.
2. Go to Contributions → Management → Cont-Transfer and execute two transfers.
3. Transfer contributions from Mary Smith Household to the Mary Smith Member.
4. Transfer contributions from John Anderson Household to the John Anderson Member.
5. Go to Contributions → Management → Cont-Maintenance → Check your funds to ensure no outstanding pledges are assigned to the Mary Smith Household.
6. Go back to Contributions → Envelopes → Env-Maintenance → Add/Edit Household #’s and delete the envelope number for the Mary Smith Household. If her number goes to zero instead of erasing completely then there is probably a pledge or contribution still out there that needs to be cleaned up.

Second, we’ll transfer Mary Smith to John Anderson’s household

1. Go to People → Members → Mem-List.
2. Click on the Last Name of the Member you wish to transfer.
3. Click the down arrow next to “View: Select an Item” and select Member transfer.
4. In the white box next to the find button enter in the Last Name of the household you wish to transfer the member to and click find button.
5. Click on the Last Name of the Household you wish to transfer the member to.
6. Press the transfer Member button.

Third, we’ll update the household record and John’s member record

1. Go to People → Households → Hse-List and select the John Anderson household.
2. Change the First Name field from “John” to “John & Mary”.
3. Change the Mail To field from “John Anderson” to “John & Mary Anderson”.
4. Click Save.
5. Click Add – View Members.
6. Select John at the top left window.
7. Change the relationship field of John to Husband.
8. Click the Save Member button.
9. View John’s Special Events.
10. Add the Marriage date and click the Save button in the Special Events window.
11. Click the Copy to Spouse button.

Lastly, we’ll update Mary’s member record

1. Select Mary at the top left window.
2. Change the relationship of Mary Smith to Wife.
3. Change the last name field of Mary Smith to Anderson.
4. Add the name Smith to the Maiden name field for Mary.
5. Click Save Member.
6. Go back to People → Households → Hse-List and open the Mary Smith Household.
7. Press the “Delete” button. You do not need to archive since the household is empty.

And you’re done! Bookmark this page so it’s handy next time there’s a wedding in your church.

Photo Credit: briannalouder via Compfight cc