Foundation/Fund/Donor Soft Credits and appeals

K. Ramey

Hi there, I have a dilemma. Our organization receives gifts from funds within foundations, ie: The Smith Family Fund within Schwab Charitable Trust. The check comes from Schwab, with annotation that it was distributed from the family fund. We know that John Smith was the one who funneled the gift our way, and he is the one who received the appeal. I am trying to transition to recording such gifts under the umbrella foundation (Schwab), with soft credits to the family fund and the donor, as this appears to be best practice (the gift/check is technically from the foundation). Relationships are in place to explain this on the constituent records. The problem I'm encountering is that when we send appeals, they go to John Smith, NOT Schwab or the family fund. So when I enter the gift under Schwab as decribed above and designate the correct appeal, I am prompted to add the appeal to Schwab (even though they never received such an appeal). I can say no, but I cannot then apply that gift amount to the appeal under John Smith's record to reflect that he responded to the appeal. Any ideas on how to handle this would be much appreciated.

JoAnn Strommen

K. Ramey:
Hi there, I have a dilemma. Our organization receives gifts from funds within foundations, ie: The Smith Family Fund within Schwab Charitable Trust. The check comes from Schwab, with annotation that it was distributed from the family fund. We know that John Smith was the one who funneled the gift our way, and he is the one who received the appeal. I am trying to transition to recording such gifts under the umbrella foundation (Schwab), with soft credits to the family fund and the donor, as this appears to be best practice (the gift/check is technically from the foundation). Relationships are in place to explain this on the constituent records. The problem I'm encountering is that when we send appeals, they go to John Smith, NOT Schwab or the family fund. So when I enter the gift under Schwab as decribed above and designate the correct appeal, I am prompted to add the appeal to Schwab (even though they never received such an appeal). I can say no, but I cannot then apply that gift amount to the appeal under John Smith's record to reflect that he responded to the appeal. Any ideas on how to handle this would be much appreciated.

Yes, the only way to record the gift under the appeal is to have it entered on the Schwab fund.  You could code it so you could remove it from reports/counts. 

Are you concerned that your # who recieved appeal will be off?  Concerned about future appeals going to those who responded?  There may be some coding you could do to avoid that.

K. Ramey

JoAnn Strommen:

Yes, the only way to record the gift under the appeal is to have it entered on the Schwab fund.  You could code it so you could remove it from reports/counts. 

Are you concerned that your # who recieved appeal will be off?  Concerned about future appeals going to those who responded?  There may be some coding you could do to avoid that.

Suggestions would be welcomed on that front. I am concerned that: #1: When a staff member looks under John Smith's constituent record, it will appear under the appeals tab as if he has not given for the appeal... they would have to do some digging to see if he had in fact responded to the appeal through his family fund and Schwab; and #2: Future appeals going to Schwab instead of John based on appeal giving. I am pretty sure the HC/SC protocol is the right way to go, but I want to be sure this won't mess up organizational needs before making the switch. Thank you!

JoAnn Strommen

K. Ramey:
Suggestions would be welcomed on that front. I am concerned that: #1: When a staff member looks under John Smith's constituent record, it will appear under the appeals tab as if he has not given for the appeal... they would have to do some digging to see if he had in fact responded to the appeal through his family fund and Schwab; and #2: Future appeals going to Schwab instead of John based on appeal giving. I am pretty sure the HC/SC protocol is the right way to go, but I want to be sure this won't mess up organizational needs before making the switch. Thank you!

Yes, #1 would be my biggest concern also.  If John is SC for the gift it will/should appear on his record's appeal tab with amount.  You probably have to add the "Gave" field as that doesn't seem to auto fill for SC. You could sure add comments on John's record Appeal that say where payment is from. 

I would probably mark Schwab record with solicit code of "Do not solicit" so that they do not get future mailings.  So for future appeal mailings you are basing who get them only on who got them in the past?  If so, yes, you'd need a way to filter out records like Schwab.

I'm basing this on what I found in our db.  My sister and brother-in-law each have constituent records.  August appeal was sent to b-i-l so appeal was part of his record.  Sister sent in a gift so it was recorded on her constituent record and appeal added to hers.  While full gift info is on her record I just looked at his record.  Appeal listing on his record shows amount he's SC, response field is blank.  Exact count after the fact of # that got appeal is not an issue for us so it doesn't matter that by adding appeal to her record number increased by one if I've used a query for the number sent on the appeal record and if past appeal were how we determined future mailings using HOH processing it wouldn't be an issue for that either.

K. Ramey

JoAnn Strommen:

Yes, #1 would be my biggest concern also.  If John is SC for the gift it will/should appear on his record's appeal tab with amount.  You probably have to add the "Gave" field as that doesn't seem to auto fill for SC. You could sure add comments on John's record Appeal that say where payment is from. 

I would probably mark Schwab record with solicit code of "Do not solicit" so that they do not get future mailings.  So for future appeal mailings you are basing who get them only on who got them in the past?  If so, yes, you'd need a way to filter out records like Schwab.

I'm basing this on what I found in our db.  My sister and brother-in-law each have constituent records.  August appeal was sent to b-i-l so appeal was part of his record.  Sister sent in a gift so it was recorded on her constituent record and appeal added to hers.  While full gift info is on her record I just looked at his record.  Appeal listing on his record shows amount he's SC, response field is blank.  Exact count after the fact of # that got appeal is not an issue for us so it doesn't matter that by adding appeal to her record number increased by one if I've used a query for the number sent on the appeal record and if past appeal were how we determined future mailings using HOH processing it wouldn't be an issue for that either.

Aha! Yes, thank you. All good ideas. I think I have a handle on it now, and my reporting shouldn't be off if I build my queries/exports correctly. Moving right along in my clean-up plans!