Family Trusts - Best Practice

Michael Steven

Hello,


Just wondering how other people deal with scenarios like this, where you are in contact with people who have a Family Trust primarily as a giving vehicle (so not one you would necessarily make an application to etc) but unsure which record to record information?


Here is my theoretical scenario - two constituents:

• Mr A Smith (Trustee)
• ASmith Charitable Trust
  We have decided we will store Proposals and Gifts, along with Stewardship and Acknowledgement Attributes on the Trust Record. Mr A Smith will be a Primary Contact for the Trust, so will receive mailings, at his own address. He will also be soft-credited the gifts.
  
  
  So far, so good - However, what we are struggling to decide on is where we should be storing Notes and Actions - under Mr Smith’s record, because you were first in contact with him and deal with directly, or under the Trust’s record, so everything is all in one place.
  
   
  We have been going back and forth regarding what is best practice, so are curious how other organisations tackle this.  What would be ideal is if Note and Actions could almost be ‘soft copied’ to the other record without the duplication of adding to both records?
  
   
  Any feedback would be greatly appreciated.
  
   
  Many thanks,
  
   
  Michael

Lindy Kingins

I believe in the Keep it Simple method. Anything relating to the Trust goes on the Trust record. Mr. Smith is on the trust record as a relationship, and perhaps the primary contact, but all notes should remain together. We view individual records, such as Mr. Smith's as a place to record only personal information and activities such as memberships. Gifts from the trust would be s/c to Mr. Smith. No need to duplicate notes.  It only takes one note on Mr. Smith's record:  See Trust record. This can be added as a notepad, but better, add it as a Annotate so it pops up every time someone open's Mr. Smith's record.

Michael Steven

Lindy Kingins:

I believe in the Keep it Simple method. Anything relating to the Trust goes on the Trust record. Mr. Smith is on the trust record as a relationship, and perhaps the primary contact, but all notes should remain together. We view individual records, such as Mr. Smith's as a place to record only personal information and activities such as memberships. Gifts from the trust would be s/c to Mr. Smith. No need to duplicate notes.  It only takes one note on Mr. Smith's record:  See Trust record. This can be added as a notepad, but better, add it as a Annotate so it pops up every time someone open's Mr. Smith's record.

Thanks Lindy, this is the method we have been considering - using a pop-up annotation to advise to look at the other record.


I think the main problem is that we have is the scenario where an email / phone call might be relating to them / their Membership and a potential gift (which would be coming from their Trust).

 
It is further complicated when we only discover they have a Family Trust, and wish to give through this, at point of the Gift being made, so there is already a whole trail of notes and actions relating to the gift on their individual record...

 
(Unfortunately there is often no way of knowing they have a trust until they tell you; there is no legal obligation to publically reveal trustees of charities in Scotland so this can't be discovered by research).


I think it may just be one of those tricky scenarios where you can't set procedures in stone (the worst kind!).


Interested to hear if anyone else has any smart or unusual ways of dealing with scenarios like this.


Thanks,


Mike