IconCMO Blog

But I haven’t Spent my Budget (p2)

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Here’s the second part of a three-part series. If you haven’t read the first part of this series please read it here.jar of money with the word budget on it and filled with american paper currency representing

Budgets work on assumptions, whereas financial statements work on actuals – what really happened to the money. Let’s look at some assumptions below that arise when ministries say they still have money in the budget but the organization doesn’t have any.

  1. Assumption #1 – revenue will come in as expected to fund the organization’s various ministries. What happens when the revenue doesn’t come in as expected? There is a direct correlation between revenue and expenses. In other words if you don’t have the money coming in, you can’t spend what you don’t have. 🙂
    1. The easiest way to explain this is using a personal household budget. Let say the household’s income (revenue) is $1200.00 per month and expenses are exactly $1200.00 per month. Let’s say a person doesn’t go to work one day during the month, so their income drops to $1150.00 but the expenses stay the same at $1200.00. At this point the household has to make a decision. Do they find a way to cut their expenses or pick up some extra work on the weekend to make up for the day they missed? Similarly, donations may decrease during the month, but ministries are expecting the full amount of money for their budgeted expense items. A decision must be made and some possibilities are the organization figures out how to get more donations coming in or cut a ministry’s budget.
  2. Assumption #2 – increasing revenue is easy so we can get the budget looking better. Most financial advisers say increasing revenue is the most difficult, when they discuss personal finances. I would venture to say the same is with organizations. Increasing revenue is hard as it takes time connecting with people, building trust, and so on – just like in personal finances waiting for that next job promotion or salary raise. The fastest and easiest way to stay on budget, is to cut expenses or reallocation of spending – ie. rob Peter to pay Paul.
  3. Assumption #3 – expenses increase/decrease like heat, food, and so on that wasn’t accounted for when the budget was made. In today’s society, inflation or deflation happens and there’s no escaping that. A prime example was just a few weeks ago gas dropped across the country from about $3.80/gallon to $1.90/gallon. There wasn’t one person that would’ve predicted the price deflation, let alone the hundreds of line items on a budget that the church tries to forecast each year. 🙂 Keep in mind that this example would have worked to the benefit of the church, but what would the church’s budget look like if gas sky rocketed to $6.00/gallon and stayed there for 1 – 2 years? In some cases this could mean financial ruins for a church.

Stay tuned for the last part in this series.

Read part three.

But I haven’t Spent my Budget (p1)

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How many times have church leadership heard a similar phrase to, ‘But I haven’t spent my budget’, when discussing ministry finances? jar of money with the word budget on it and filled with american paper currency representing

In working with churches and their accounting systems, which involves budgeting, I see a lot of focus around budgets instead of the standard financial accounting reports approved by FASB (Financial Accounting Standard Board). While budgets are good tools, nonprofits must understand they are only a tool and don’t replace common sense understanding of financial statements.

Budgets don’t tell the organizations if it’s financially healthy or if they can embark on a new project or mission. Furthermore, when your audited, budgets are not even looked at, but in many instances have the most time devoted to them by staff or volunteers. Auditors want to know the revenue that came in and what you actually spent the money on – not what was projected. 🙂 From the perspective of auditing and organizational financial health, the budget which has the most time dedicated to it, has very little if any importance. It would appear that financial statements that show what actually happened is more important, but less time is devoted in understanding them.

If I could make an analogy here about budgets and what they have become to many organizations – not just non-profits. Budgets are treated like a storage tank for each line item. For example, at the start of the fiscal year, this storage tank gets filled up with all the money for each line item so each ministry has their allotted money for the year. There’s one enormous problem with this thought process. The organization hasn’t collected the money to fill the tanks up yet. Because the organization is just starting its fiscal year and needs donations to fill the tanks, the ministries can’t assume they have the money because the budget says so. The tanks get filled as the year progresses and donations come into the organization, not on the first day of the fiscal year.

Stay tuned for the second part in this three-part series. We will discuss some budget assumptions that can really turn things upside down.

Read part two

Read part three

Introducing IconRubix

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The Next Generation in Church Management

lightstock_149580_full_michelleIcon Systems just announced the release of IconRubix, its next generation church management software platform. IconRubix is built on the latest technology and boasts features such as mobile responsiveness, real time collaboration, and a child check-in system.

“We met with several organizational leaders in the church community. Armed with their feedback, our goals were set high; we wanted to develop a system with limited hardware investment, real time collaboration, and unprecedented flexibility,” says Bill Gifford, President. “Having a cloud based system wasn’t enough in and of itself. Our goal was to create something truly innovative – something that promoted team collaboration by allowing church staff and volunteers to see changes right as they happen.”

We’ve designed IconRubix to work smoothly on your mobile device, just as it does on your desktop computer. There’s no need to download a separate application. Unlike other systems, IconRubix doesn’t require the church to invest in specific printers or other expensive hardware to use the check-in system, record contributions, or perform other tasks. Churches can use their current hardware or implement a BYOD (Bring Your Own Device) policy. Some additional features include:

  • Realtime collaboration
  • Membership records
  • Donation tracking
  • Group management
  • Child check-in
  • Communication
  • Reports
  • And more!

Learn more and sign up for a free trial at https://www.iconcmo.com/products/rubix/.

About Icon Systems: For more than 20 years, Icon Systems has been developing software exclusively for churches and religious organizations. Icon Systems offers multiple church management software packages that will meet the needs of any religious organization-from church plants to denominational offices.

Read the full press release at http://www.marketwired.com/press-release/icon-systems-releases-iconrubix-2181114.htm

Things to know to effectively use IconCMO

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church-audit-checklistMembership

Must Know #1: (Household or Member)

Understanding the difference between a Household and a Member is important and is defined as follows:

Definition of a Household: A Household is a physical location where people reside and the name of the household represents the adults that are responsible for the loaction. It does not represent an individual.

Definition of a Member: A Member is a person that resides at the location. Every member of a family should have a member record in the system.

Whenever you are doing something in the system ask yourself the question: Do I need this for member(s) or household(s). Example: I need to create mailing labels for people that receive the newsletter. Are these labels going to be sent to individual members or to the households? Chances are they are going to be sent to the Households. If this is the answer then you would go to People -> Groups -> Grp-Households. Create a category called Mailings and a sub-group called Newsletter. Add the households to the group and print your labels. Or you can go to People -> Households -> Hse-Reports -> Household List and select to print labels for all Households belonging to one or more status groups.

If you are adding a new Person in the system that is the only member of the new household, one household record would be added refelecting the location and one member record representing the individual living at that location.

For a married couple the household name should contain both the names of the parents. The household ‘First Name’ would be something like John & Mary. Once the household is created both John, Mary and any kids they might have would be added into the household as members.

Must Know #2 (Running Reports using Multiple Status Codes)

Many of the reports give you the ability to select status codes. Multilple status codes can be selected by holding the “Ctrl” key down on the keyboard. While the Ctrl key is down use the mouse to click on the status codes you wish to use. When done selecting release the Ctrl key and run the report.

Must Know #3 (Adding Status Codes)

Status codes are used to define the relationship of a household or member to the church. When the system is initially loaded it contains the default status codes Active, Inactive, Visitor and Delete. However, you can add additional status codes by going to Organization -> Preferences – Church Membership. Locate the field “Select Drop Down List”. Click the down arrow and select Status. Go to field “New / Modified Value” and enter the new status code and click “Save New/Modified”.

Please Note: It is not a good practice to define a new status code if a household or person can fall into more than one status code. Example: Adding a status code of Choir and Usher would be bad because a person could belong to both groups as be Active. In this case the person should have a status of ‘Active’ and belong to both the ‘Choir’ group and the ‘Usher’ group. Use the Groups section to classify Choir members and Ushers.

The most common Status codes we see are: (This field has a maximum of 15 characters so some of these are abbreviated).

    • Active
    • Inactive
    • Visitor
    • Delete
    • Active NonMem ( Abbreviation for Active Non-Member )
    • Associate Mem ( Associate Member )
    • Friend
    • Prospect
    • Shutin

Accounting

Must Know #4: (Contribution Funds Vs Accounting Funds)

This section talks you through the process of setting up the link between the Contribution system and the Accounting system. In order to use this link go to Organization -> Preferences -> Church Membership. Set the “Link to Fund Accounting” to Yes and click save. This tells the system that whenever contributions are posted the system should also update the accounting system accordingly. This is a powerful feature of IconCMO and can be used to insure that activity in the contribution section is always recorded in the accounting system.

There are two different types of Funds that can be created in IconCMO.

  1. Contribution Funds
  2. Accounting Funds

Contribution Funds (C-Funds) are funds that people contribute to. Contribution Statements are printed from information that is posted to C-Funds.

Accounting Funds (A-Funds) are funds that are defined by the financial group in the church for the purpose of managing the finances of the church. For example: In addition to the ‘General Fund’ (which is a required fund) the board might have a Building Fund and a Charities Fund. A separate ‘Statement of Activities’ (sometimes referred to as a Profit and Loss statement) and a ‘Statement of Financial Position’ (sometimes referred to a Balance Sheet) can be run for each fund defined as well as for all accounting funds combined. It is important to note that all contribution funds must direct its donations into one of the accounting funds. First, the bank account that receives the donations is defined and second, the Contribution Revenue account is defined.

Below is Example:

Your church offers the church four different c-funds which they can contribute to.

  1. General Fund
  2. Building Fund
  3. Memorial Fund
  4. Flowers Fund

Each of these C-Funds will be defined by going to Contributions -> Management -> Cont-Maintenance and adding the C-Funds names. You want to print a Profit and Loss for General, Building and Charities but you would like the Flowers Fund to appear as Revenue to the Charities Fund. You need to create three A-Funds by going to General Ledger -> Funds -> Fund Maintenance. From the Fund Maintenance window you will add the Building and Charities Funds (The General Fund already exists). Then go to General Ledger -> GL -> Chart of Accounts. There needs to be at least one Contribution Revenue account to define where the revenue is coming from. In this case let’s define three revenue accounts and call them:

  1. General Contributions
  2. Building Contributions
  3. Memorial Contributions

Note that we use the term ‘Contributions’ instead of ‘Revenue’. This was done simply to demonstrate that these are chart of account names and not funds. In addition to the the Contribution Revenue accounts we need at least on bank account. Let’s call that ‘Checking’.

Now we need to create the links between the C-Funds to the Accounting system. Go to Contributions -> Management -> Cont-Maintenance, select the General Fund in the left scroll window and press the button titled ‘Accounting Link’. A window opens displaying the fund selected and three drop down boxes. The example below shows how we might make the assignments. Notice how contributions to the ‘Flowers Fund’ is directed to the accounting fund called Memorial. Revenue from the Flowers Fund will appear in the Statement of Activites’ for Charities.

General Fund (C-Fund)

  • Accounting Fund Affected = General Fund
  • Bank Account = Checking
  • Contribution Account = General Contributions

Building Fund (C-Fund)

  • Accounting Fund Affected = Building Fund
  • Bank Account = Checking
  • Contribution Account = Building Contributions

Memorial Fund (C-Fund)

  • Accounting Fund Affected = Charities Fund
  • Bank Account = Checking
  • Contribution Account = Memorial Contributions

Flowers Fund (C-Fund)

  • Accounting Fund Affected = Charities Fund
  • Bank Account = Checking (whatever checking or savings account you want the money deposited)
  • Contribution Account = Memorial Contributions

We made a bunch of enhancements to Accounts Receivable

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Grab your party hat, we have exciting news for you! Over the summer, our developers have been busy enhancing the Accounts Receivable (AR) module in IconCMO. The party *ahem* release is scheduled for late in the evening Wednesday, September 21st 2016. Update: the enhancements are now live!

Photo credit: Delaney Dawson
Photo credit: Delaney Dawson

I know the list of enhancements is long, but don’t freak out! There are few big changes, mostly little things here and there that will make the module more intuitive and therefore easier to use. We really think you’re going to love it.

What’s new?

We’ve broken down the enhancements window-by-window.

Invoices/Credit Memos

  • An invoice can have different fund assignments for each line item.
  • An invoice can be emailed and posted from the invoice window immediately after being posted. Invoices can also be printed multiple times.
  • The invoice number was removed from the window. This is so multiple people can add invoices at the same time without creating conflicting invoice numbers.
  • If taxes are applicable, they are applied per line item. Both non-taxed and taxable items can be on the same invoice.
  • Selecting a customer no longer requires a sub window to go to allowing for faster selection.
  • Credit Memos are in the same window as creating invoices.
  • Invoice batching has been streamlined dramatically. Batched invoices can be printed and viewed and voided after posting.
  • Invoices page break nicely. Previously, if an invoice had enough line items to span multiple pages, it would run off the page.
  • Negative line items can be applied to invoices.

Payments

  • Payment information is easier to enter; it’s all at the top of the window.
  • Payments are automatically distributed to the oldest invoices.
  • Payments can be applied to specific line items of an invoice.
  • Payments are posted directly into an Undeposited account that appears on the Statement of Financial Position.
  • The Deposit Window only shows a single transaction line for each payment.
  • Multiple payments from the same customer can be received without depositing the receipts. Yay!
  • Discounts and overpayments can be applied directly on each line item. More importantly, it will not allow you to apply a discount and an overpayment at the same time.

Deposits

  • Shows everything as before and also tells you what ArPmt belongs to the deposit from the customer.
  • Allows you to delete the deposit right from this window and reverts it back to the AR Payments window and puts the money back in Undeposited.

Refund

  • This window is completely new. Refunds used to be done on the payment window (that was weird.)
  • If a check that has been applied to invoice is returned to you as NSF (non-sufficient funds) you can enter the Refund window and apply the money back to the church reverting the invoice back to its original state.
  • ArChks can be reprinted for any reason.
  • Refunds cannot be issued against invoices when it causes the invoice to owe more than the original invoice.  This really helps keep things in balance on what has been paid versus what was owed.

Customer Activity

  • This window displays an AR Ledger with each customer’s activity. It shows the transaction amount and the memo indicates the invoice to which it was applied.
  • Selecting a transaction shows line by line detail. At the bottom in blue, you will see more information — this includes which ARDep a particular payment was applied to.

AR Register

  • No enhancements; this window allows you to see which GL accounts a transaction hits.

AR Reports

  • Customer Statements prints only customers carrying a balance owed. This way you can print statements without filtering out customers without a balance or ones with a credit. A checkbox still exists to display all customers with activity.

P.S. If you’re using AR, we’d love to hear what you think! Leave a comment below.

Archiving members in IconCMO

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Archiving is a great way to keep your database clean and your household counts down. Changing a members statuspablo-12 to delete is different than actually archiving them. Archiving can be done at the household level or the member level. Although you can archive all members of a households at once, only the members are archived, not the household. You will need to unarchive each member of the household separately.

STEP BY STEP INSTRUCTIONS ON ARCHIVING

Household: Archiving all members of a household
  1. Go to People: Household: Hse-List
  2. Select the household you wish to archive
  3. Click “Delete”
  4. If contributions are applied to the household (household envelope) you will get the message: “This household last contributed money on “date.  Are you sure you want to delete this household?”
  5. Click “OK”
  6. You will then get the message: “Do you want to archive the household members?”
  7. Click “Yes”
  8. Please enter a reason for archiving – * required.
  9. Click “Yes”
Member: Archiving one member of a household
  1. Go to People: Members: Mem-List
  2. Select the member you wish to archive
  3. Click “Delete Member”
  4. If contributions are applied to the member (member envelope) you will get the message: “Are you sure you want to delete this member?”
  5. Click “OK”
  6. You will then message: “Do you wish to send this member information to the archives?”
  7. Click “Yes”
  8. Please enter a reason for archiving – * required.
  9. Click “Yes”

NOTES

Because only members are archived, any household notes stored in the household section will be lost. To make sure these notes are retained, you will need to transfer them to a member. Simply highlight the household notes and paste them into the member notes (Ctrl+C – copy & Ctrl+V – paste).

CONTRIBUTION STATEMENTS

You can unarchive a member to print their contribution statement at any time.  If you restore them to their “Original Household” the contribution records automatically are attached to the household.  If you choose to add the member to a new household, you need to create a household, unarchive the member into the new household and then go into Contributions: Envelopes: Env-Maintenance and give the new household an envelope number.  Finally go into Contributions: Management: Cont-Transfer and transfer the contributions from the old household into the new household.

REPORTS/UNARCHIVING

Go to People: Members: Archives for a list of archived members. This report can be filter by status and 4 additional fields can be displayed. To unarchive a member simple click on the their last name in this report. A new window will open displaying their name and previous household. Click on the “Unarchive” button. If you try to unarchive a member where the entire household has been archived you will get the following message. “The household this member belongs to no longer exists. Would you like to restore the original household or choose a new household to add them to (losing the original address information)”. If you are going to unarchive them to a different household, the household must be created before unarchiving the member.

VolunteerSpot is now SignUp.com

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signup-logo-large

Icon System’s partner company VolunteerSpot recently announced they’ve changed their name to SignUp.com.

VolunteerSpot has a new name and a new look—and that’s it. Since our founding, people have used our helpful solutions for every kind of activity that relies on successful group coordination, not just volunteering. Our new name lets us better serve the needs of our entire audience. We still offer the same great tools and solutions for coordinating people and generating successful participation. Your account and all your activities are still here – just log in as usual and get going.” – Karen Bantuveris, Founder and CEO

Read the full announcement at http://signup.com/Our-New-Name.

About SignUp.com

SignUp.com offers FREE and easy online volunteer coordination tool and online signup sheets. Save time and say goodbye to reply all email, spreadsheet juggling, illegible clipboard signup sheets and phone-tag. SignUp.com makes it easy for ANYONE in the congregation to schedule, sign up and remind volunteers. SignUp.com’s premium service includes advanced features like hours tracking and custom registration fields.

P.S. Don’t have a SignUp.com account yet? Use promo code ICON100 to receive three additional months free with your paid premium upgrade.

Save Time and Money with IconCMO

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Staying organized and communicating with members of the congregation can be inexpensive and easy with IconCMO.  Monthly newsletters, bulletins, schedules, and calendars can be created in Word or Publisher, converted to PDF and attached to an email message without the high cost of printing and mailing, not to mention the time spent folding and stuffing envelopes.  If an event is canceled, send out a quick text message notifying members.

envelopes

Email and Text Message Setup:

  1. Go to Organization: Preferences: Personal and enter the church email address you want to use for outgoing emails. This will automatically populate in the “From” field when sending emails.
  2. Go to Organization: Preferences: Church Membership
    • Click Maintain Phone – Email Types
    • This is where you will title the phone numbers and emails you wish to maintain e.g. Home Phone, Cell Phone, Work Phone, Personal Email, Work Email
    • When you title the cell/mobile phone, be sure to check the “Cell Phone?” box on the right. When entering someone’s phone number, this will allow you to select the carrier and send them text messages. Cell phone carriers must be identified in order to send text messages.Cell phone setup - red

Member Email Setup:

  1. Go to People: Members: Mem-List
  2. Click on the drop-down arrow next to “View” and select “Email Addresses”
  3. At the bottom, select the “Email Name” e.g. Work email, Personal email
  4. Type in the member’s email address
  5. Select Opt-In Preferred, Opt-In, Opt-Unknown, or Opt-Out
  6. If the member does not want their email address listed in the church directory, check the “Unlisted” box
  7. Click “Save Email”Member's email red

Member Text Message Setup:

  1. Go To People: Members: Mem-List
  2. Click the drop-down arrow next to “View” and select “Phone Numbers”
  3. Select the Phone Name e.g. Home Phone, Cell Phone
  4. Type in their phone number
  5. Select their carrier using the drop-down arrow
  6. Click “Save” Member's Cell phone red

Once emails and phone numbers are entered, you will want to create groups to contact e.g. Teachers, Parents, Ushers. Groups can be entered by household or by member.  If you are entering by the household, the email address listed for the household is the one that will be used. If you want specific members within the household to receive the email, set the group up in Grp-Members.

Groups Setup:

  1. Go to People: Groups: Grp-Members or People: Groups: Grp-Household
  2. Under Add New click “Group Category” and enter the name – click “Add”
  3. Select the category you created and under Add New click “Group”
  4. Enter the name of the group – click “Add”
  5. Select the group, such as Teachers
  6. Add members to the group.
    • You can do this by selecting your criteria, active, age range, name range and then click “Find”
    • The members will populate in the list on the right
    • If you want a member to be in this group, click the “No” to change it to a “Yes”
    • When you are done, click “Show Group Only” to make sure you have added everyone

Once your groups are set up, you can begin sending emails or text messages by selecting the group you wish to contact and clicking on either “Text Message” or “Group Email”. Teachers - red

Contributions Statements can also be emailed monthly or quarterly so members can review their giving. Or save even more time by setting up the Parishioner’s Module to allow members to review their giving whenever they want.  

Do you know how to spot a tech support scam?

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According to Wikipedia, a technical support scam (often abbreviated tech support scam) refers to a class of telephone fraud activities, in which a scammer claims to offer a legitimate technical support service, often via cold calls to unsuspecting users. Such cold calls are mostly targeted at Microsoft Windows users, with the caller often claiming to represent a Microsoft technical support department. (Side note: it’s not likely anyone would call and fraudulently pretend to be an Icon Systems representative. But if you’re ever in doubt, get the person’s name and call them back on our support line.)

Church staff and volunteers should be aware of techniques used by scammers. For tips on identifying and avoiding scams, head over to the Federal Trade Commission’s website and read this article on Tech Support Scams.

Are you using the Parishioner’s Module?

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The Parishioner’s Module is one of the most useful resources available for church members and staff. And the best part is, there’s no additional cost! It’s already included in your subscription to IconCMO. If you aren’t familiar with the parishioner’s module, it’s a secure self-service login where members can view their own contact information, contribution history, and access a church directory. It’s even mobile-friendly so members can sign in using their smart phone or tablet!

iconcmo-church-member-login

Step 1: Set up your customized login page

We just released an exciting new feature that allows church staff and volunteers to log in via a customized login page. Click here for more information and instructions.

Login button

Step 2: Assign security permissions

As households are added in IconCMO, they are automatically assigned a user name in the parishioner’s security window. But the church controls the type of access members are given.

  • No-Access is initially assigned to all households entered into IconCMO. So by default, households do not have access to the parishioner’s module.
  • Read-only access allows members to login and view their information. If anything is incorrect, members can email changes to the church office directly from the parishioner’s module.
  • Read-write access allows members to view and make changes to their own contact information. (For obvious reasons, members cannot make changes to their giving history or other members’ information in the church directory. They would need to notify the church office of any errors.)
IconCMO Parishioner Security
By clicking on the blue text under Access Type, you can determine if members have No-Access, Read-Only or Read-Write access.

Step 3: Give it a try

If you’re interested in taking the parishioner’s module for a test drive, follow these steps.

  1. If you’re not already, set yourself up as a household in your church’s database (you can delete it later.)
  2. Go to Web-Services: WS Setup: Parishioner Security.
  3. Search for your last name and click on the blue No-Access under Access Type.
  4. Change your security to the Read-Only or Read-Write.
  5. After you change the access type, you will notice a message at the bottom of the box that reads, “Send email to “your name” telling them their access has been granted?” Click Send Email.
  6. When you log in, make sure you are using the new user name that was emailed to you, not your staff login.
  7. You will be prompted to change this. Note: Make sure you use a different user id and password than your staff login for IconCMO.

Parishioners-Module-Screen-Shot

Step 4: Generate reports

Don’t worry, if you give members read-write access so they have the ability to change their personal information, you will always be kept up-to-date by running these reports in the People – Households – Hse-Reports window.

Parishioner Changes – Provides the church with the member’s name, information that was changed and the date it was changed.

Parishioner Last Log in – Provides the names of households who have accessed their information.