Recording in memoriam gifts

Joy Cox 2

What is the best way to record in mem gifts?   Should the gifts go on the deceased's record and then the donor as a relationship? or should new records be set up for the donors and then be soft credited to the deceased?  I am apprehensive about adding the donor of the gift as a new constituent as this then looks like a new donors when it really isn't'.  I have seen it done so many different ways so am unsure what's best.  I would usually add it to the deceased person's' record as then you have an easy way of checking total numbers of gifts if asked by a relative.  Any thoughts?

John Heizer

The gift should always go on the donor's record.



Do you have the Tribute module?  It handles all this very well.

Karen Stuhlfeier

I agree that the Tribute module handles all of this really well. If the gift is from someone who is not currently on our database we give them the constituency code of Memorial Gift Aquaintance. We can easily exclude them from mailings and appeals. The deceased person is not soft credited for the gift.

Sunshine Reinken Watson

We always record the gift on the donor's record. We don't receive enough tribute gifts to warrant the tribute module, so I set up gift attributes to track tribute information.

JoAnn Strommen

We always record gift on donor record.  Creating new record when necessary.  We do not soft credit to deceased.  It was not their money/they did not give it etc. so it clearly does not meet our definition for a SC. 



For donors who are added just because they give a memorial gift, we use a constituent code of "Donor Memorial/Honorarium".  This allows them to be excluded when doing new donor counts.  Depending on what fund the memorial goes to, we may also need an assigned solicitor for the fund for so gift is included in reports.  So we have a record: Memorial - Honorarium Solicitor.    We also utilize the gift code field for funds where gifts are reported by gift code.



We do not have the tribute module either. To find/report on all the gifts we have used the reference field and when the deceased was a board member and we know we would have a large # of gifts we created an appeal.  This provided a very easy way to create lists for family and report on total $ received. 



Just my 2 cents...

Michael Manning 2

I add the donor as a constituent.  Technically, they are a new donor and the gift could renew the following year.  I have a gift attribute set up for In Memory and In Honor of gifts.  The Data Type for the attribute is set to Constituent Name. 

Christine Cooke 2

Add the donor as a constituent if necessary (if they are not already in your RE).  The monies are from the donor, you have to record as such.  Do Not soff credit the deceased.  Add the donor as a relationship to the deceased.  On the gift record the Appeal is IHO (in honor of for those that are alive) and IMO (in memory of if they are deceased).  That way, they can be filtered out of reporting or specifically filtered into reporting.

If you do not have the Tribute module, and I know many smaller orgs do not.  Set up and utilize the Gift Attributes to list the IHO/IMO person's name, and also attribute fields for addressing an acknowledgement to the family of the decedent/honored.  Addressee, Salutation, Address, City, State and Zip.  That way you can export that in a mail merge and have the name/address of the donor, the name of the Tributee, and the contact info for the family of Tributee. 

I then set up acknowledgement letters that have a second page that goes to the family, that is set up however your org. perfers -- a card, a letter whatever.  Works quite well and then there is no hand manipulating and remembering and triple checking that you have everyone.  If it so happens that there is no family to notify you just leave the Gift Attributes blank and then delete that second page before you print.

Joy Cox 2

Hi everyone,



Thank you so much for yur replies.  That has really helped as everone is saying exactly the same thing -recording the gift on the donor's record.  This is what I will do. I won't soft credit, but will ensure there is a relationship betwen the decease and the donor if not already present.  A constituent code is a great idea as this will  make it easy to exclude the donor from our mailings. 



Thank you everyone!

Joy Cox 2

No we don't have the Tribute module.  It would be useful to make a case for purchasing it if someone could tell me how it works?



Thanks

Sunshine Reinken Watson

Christine Cooke:

Add the donor as a constituent if necessary (if they are not already in your RE).  The monies are from the donor, you have to record as such.  Do Not soff credit the deceased.  Add the donor as a relationship to the deceased.  On the gift record the Appeal is IHO (in honor of for those that are alive) and IMO (in memory of if they are deceased).  That way, they can be filtered out of reporting or specifically filtered into reporting.

If you do not have the Tribute module, and I know many smaller orgs do not.  Set up and utilize the Gift Attributes to list the IHO/IMO person's name, and also attribute fields for addressing an acknowledgement to the family of the decedent/honored.  Addressee, Salutation, Address, City, State and Zip.  That way you can export that in a mail merge and have the name/address of the donor, the name of the Tributee, and the contact info for the family of Tributee. 

I then set up acknowledgement letters that have a second page that goes to the family, that is set up however your org. perfers -- a card, a letter whatever.  Works quite well and then there is no hand manipulating and remembering and triple checking that you have everyone.  If it so happens that there is no family to notify you just leave the Gift Attributes blank and then delete that second page before you print.

Great idea for the letter! I'm going to try that.

John Heizer

Joy Cox:

No we don't have the Tribute module.  It would be useful to make a case for purchasing it if someone could tell me how it works?



Thanks

You can learn about the Tribute module here: https://kb.blackbaud.com/articles/Article/46060



And there's a guide on how to track such gifts without the module here:  https://kb.blackbaud.com/articles/Article/37622



I also advise anyone looking at purchasing one of the optional modules to play around with the desired functionality using the Sample Database, which has all the optional modules enabled.  That way you can make sure you'll get what you need (or at least know the shortcomings before spending on it).

John Heizer

Joy Cox:

Hi everyone,



Thank you so much for yur replies.  That has really helped as everone is saying exactly the same thing -recording the gift on the donor's record.  This is what I will do. I won't soft credit, but will ensure there is a relationship betwen the decease and the donor if not already present.  A constituent code is a great idea as this will  make it easy to exclude the donor from our mailings. 



Thank you everyone!

My advice, if your goal is to exclude these donors from mailings, to make it a Solicit Code (instead of, or in addition to, the Constituent Code).  The Mail module lets you easily exclude by Solicit Code, but not by Constituent Code (it will only let you filter "Include" by Constituent Code, which is very frustrating when I want to send a mailing to everyone except board members, which is the same thing you'll run into using a Constituent Code to exclude tribute donors from a mailing).  Some folks use an Attribute instead of Solicit Codes and you can get the same results in the Mail module with the Attribute, but not with Constituent Codes.



I often say that the Solicit Code should be thought of as the Do Not Solicit Code. 

JoAnn Strommen

Joy,



As always with RE you need to do what works for your org.  But I'll stick my nose in it, maybe it's just a few gifts, but maybe it's a lot.  What purpose does creating a relationship with the deceased and the memorial donors have for you? 



To me, and this is just for our org, I don't see it serving a need and is a bunch of work.  For some it would be a few records for others it would be over a hundred relationships appearing on that tab that to me is just clutter.  I can find/filter/list gifts by other means mentioned.  This relationship does not help with that, to me anyway...



Just my added 2 cents.



 

Jennifer Lange

An extra bonus if you have ImportOMatic - I set up an Import where at the end of each month, I Query all tributes and IOM places relationships/recip on the accounts automatically. Helps if you have volume!  Which I do at the holidays.