Tributes

Judith Minder · August 2017

We use Raiser's Edge 7 and NXT, and are fairly new to the systems (2015). I am looking for input/advice on how other organizations handle Tributes - Honor/Memorial gifts. We were directed to create a new constituent account for Tributes, but that seems cumbersome to me since it would technically create a duplicate account. I would appreciate ideas on how others are handling these.

Ryan Hyde · August 2017

New constituent records only need to be created if the constituent does not yet exist in your database. Otherwise, you can feel free to use the existing constituent.

So if a donor passes away, you find that donor, mark them deceased, and then go about setting up the HM tab appropriately. Then all gifts just get applied to that person's HM record.

To speed that part of the process up, you can set up your business rules to automatically create a new tribute record when a constituent is marked as deceased. Go to Config > Business Rules > Constituent Options > Deceased options. That page should be pretty self explanatory. Of course if it's just an "in honor of" and not "in memory of" kind of tribute, then you'll just need to manually add the appropriate tribute to the constituent the first time a gift comes in that way.

However, it can still be cumbersome to set up a new constituent record to receive gifts, and it happens to us a lot. We're a humane society and get lots of gifts in memory of deceased pets, and each pet does become a constituent in your database. I've toyed with other ways of handling this sort of thing, but all of them are unsatisfactory to me for one reason or another, so I just use the system the way Blackbaud built it, even though it is cumbersome.

Joanne Felci 2 · August 2017

The way we handle tribute/memorial gifts is on the gift itself we use a separate appeal (I think it is HON for in honor of and MEM for in memorial of) and in the reference part of the gift record we put the name of who it is in honor/memory of (i.e. HON Joanne Felci)

We can then easily pull a query for everyone that contains part of the person's name in the reference field for the gift, if we are asked to send a total for donations received for a certain individual.

shani traum · August 2017

If the deceased is in RE, we add the memorial to their record via the Tribute Tab.

If the deceased is not in RE, but the next-of-kin is, we add the memorial the their record's tribute tab and link the gifts accordingly.

If neither the deceased nor a family member is in RE, we add the memorial to a record called In Memory 2017 and like the gifts accordingly.

All Tribute gifts have the appeal code Tribute.

Hope this helps!

Amanda Hester · August 2017

I work for a hospice organization, and of all the responses you've received, Ryan's is the best. That's the most accurate and efficient way to handle the data. The other ways will end up creating more work for you in the long run, and end up putting incomplete data into your system (bad in = bad out, good in = good out).

Judith Minder:

We use Raiser's Edge 7 and NXT, and are fairly new to the systems (2015). I am looking for input/advice on how other organizations handle Tributes - Honor/Memorial gifts. We were directed to create a new constituent account for Tributes, but that seems cumbersome to me since it would technically create a duplicate account. I would appreciate ideas on how others are handling these.

Jen Claudy · August 2017

At my last 2 orgs, we found the Tribute Module so cumbersome that we removed it from our contract. A couple of Gift Attributes and when needed a Gift Notepad Type handled the data we needed. Neither org got a tremendous number of tributes. If it was a case where the org was listed in the obituary, we would create a Constituent Record (although there probably already was one) and link those donating as Relationships with Type "Tribute Donor/Recipient". Many times, it was one of a handful of folks who regularly sent $20-50 as a tribute to someone who didn't live in the area, wasn't in our database, and of whom we most likely would never hear again, so we would add any relevant information in the Gift Note or possibly on a Constituent Note on the Donor's record, depending on the situation. The Gift Attributes handled wording for needed text in our donor lists, so this worked well for us.

At my last org, when we got NXT, we got the Tribute Module back, but I didn't go back to using it...especially because it can, over time and again depending on volume, add a lot of records to your database that are then never used for anything else...and NXT pricing is on number of records. I'm not in the habit of deleting records from RE, but I also don't like adding records that are not relevant or useful.

I didn't even use it in OLX, just used Gift Attributes for that information. But, if you need the data for reporting, or if you get a high volume of tribute gifts or a volume of gifts for a single tributee, then using the module may make much more sense. For me, it was just more hassle than it was worth.

The Tribute Module is really not designed well. I suspect the intent was to handle high volumes of tributes and of gifts to each tribute.

Alan French · August 2017

I came across an interesting suggestion somewhere recently (in slides from a Blackbaud presentation but unfortunately can't remember which one) that suggested using the tribute module to record sponsorship. We're thinking about going down that road as our current process for recording sponsorship gifts is somewhat inconsistent and this has the potential to make it easy for us to keep someone's gifts separate from money they've raised, yet allow us to report on both.

Joanne Felci 2 · August 2017

Joanne Felci:

The way we handle tribute/memorial gifts is on the gift itself we use a separate appeal (I think it is HON for in honor of and MEM for in memorial of) and in the reference part of the gift record we put the name of who it is in honor/memory of (i.e. HON Joanne Felci)

We can then easily pull a query for everyone that contains part of the person's name in the reference field for the gift, if we are asked to send a total for donations received for a certain individual.

I should probably clarify - we do not have the tribute module

Alan...interesting idea on sponsorships

Ryan Hyde · August 2017

Alan French:

I came across an interesting suggestion somewhere recently (in slides from a Blackbaud presentation but unfortunately can't remember which one) that suggested using the tribute module to record sponsorship. We're thinking about going down that road as our current process for recording sponsorship gifts is somewhat inconsistent and this has the potential to make it easy for us to keep someone's gifts separate from money they've raised, yet allow us to report on both.

YES!! I came up with this idea a couple of years ago, and it's so much more efficient and less mesy than trying to set all of these sponsors with peer solicitor records or something like that. We use Luminate for our walk-a-thon, and that attempts to set people up as solicitors, but I just intervene in the batch entry, add a tribute, delete the solicitor info, and sail right along. So much easier to report on totals in RE that way!

roger berg · August 2017

Hi Judith-

we don't use the Honor/Memorial tab. Instead, we use gift attributes. I have a gift attribute called Tribute Type - In memory of, and In honor of, and another attribute of Tribute name(s) which is a table of honoree names. I use a table for these names because we have a fair number of donors that make gifts in memory of deceased former faculty members and I want the spellings to stay consistent.

It makes it really easy to pull these for our annual report and also to put lists together (as needed) for the family of the honoree.

Judith Minder · August 2017

Ryan Hyde:

New constituent records only need to be created if the constituent does not yet exist in your database. Otherwise, you can feel free to use the existing constituent.

So if a donor passes away, you find that donor, mark them deceased, and then go about setting up the HM tab appropriately. Then all gifts just get applied to that person's HM record.

To speed that part of the process up, you can set up your business rules to automatically create a new tribute record when a constituent is marked as deceased. Go to Config > Business Rules > Constituent Options > Deceased options. That page should be pretty self explanatory. Of course if it's just an "in honor of" and not "in memory of" kind of tribute, then you'll just need to manually add the appropriate tribute to the constituent the first time a gift comes in that way.

However, it can still be cumbersome to set up a new constituent record to receive gifts, and it happens to us a lot. We're a humane society and get lots of gifts in memory of deceased pets, and each pet does become a constituent in your database. I've toyed with other ways of handling this sort of thing, but all of them are unsatisfactory to me for one reason or another, so I just use the system the way Blackbaud built it, even though it is cumbersome.

Ryan,

I like the way you handle your tributes. I prefer not to add new accounts, but use the existing "Deceased" constituent account. Do you do the same with estate gifts, using the deceased constituent account? I think it makes more sense than to have to add a new one and link it.

Judy

Ryan Hyde · August 2017

No, for estates we add an org record that looks like "Estate of Jane Doe" and we link that to the deceased constituent's record. The reason is that the estate is not the same as the deceased person, and we like to make sure that an individual, deceased or not, is not recognized as the estate. And that's partly to do with our annual audit as well - you can make the argument that RE should not be audited like this because it is not technically a financial database, but in reality, that's the way it works for lots of orgs, so best to dot your Ts and cross your Is (that's the way I said this phrase out loud this morning and I'm sticking to it)

However, just to be clear, whoever told you that you should create a new record for a deceased person even if the deceased person is already a constituent was just flat out wrong. That's not the way RE was ever intended to be used.

Judith Minder · August 2017

Ryan Hyde:

No, for estates we add an org record that looks like "Estate of Jane Doe" and we link that to the deceased constituent's record. The reason is that the estate is not the same as the deceased person, and we like to make sure that an individual, deceased or not, is not recognized as the estate. And that's partly to do with our annual audit as well - you can make the argument that RE should not be audited like this because it is not technically a financial database, but in reality, that's the way it works for lots of orgs, so best to dot your Ts and cross your Is (that's the way I said this phrase out loud this morning and I'm sticking to it)

However, just to be clear, whoever told you that you should create a new record for a deceased person even if the deceased person is already a constituent was just flat out wrong. That's not the way RE was ever intended to be used.

Ryan,

I believe I was directed that way thinking that it would result in estate gifts. Not all deceased individuals result in that. So then if we would be receiving estate gifts, it is best to make a separate account and link it to the individuals account. I guess I just see that as cumbersome, but if that is best practice so be it.

Judy

Jen Claudy · August 2017

At my last org, we tended to just change the Donor Listing text and the Constituent Codes, then enter one-time estate gifts on the now-marked-deceased Individual record. If the gift was to result in multiple payments over some length of time, we would create a separate Organization record...or if the spouse was still living, we might create a new record for the estate (depending on their relationship to us, sometimes we would just switch the names around for a deceased constituent with a surviving spouse, i.e. if every interaction we had with them was as a couple/household and everything on the record pertained equally to both). Sort of a combination. Most of our estate gifts were one or two lump sum payments and maybe a small residual payment the following year, so it didn't make much sense for us to create a new record for the estate.

Andrew Ludwell · August 2017

Judith Minder:

We use Raiser's Edge 7 and NXT, and are fairly new to the systems (2015). I am looking for input/advice on how other organizations handle Tributes - Honor/Memorial gifts. We were directed to create a new constituent account for Tributes, but that seems cumbersome to me since it would technically create a duplicate account. I would appreciate ideas on how others are handling these.

Looking through the responses above, I would like to know if any of the respondants use the Acknowledgement letters. These letters mesh with the Tribute module, using the (arguably cumbersome) way the module was designed.

Judith, if you're planning on acknowledging donors and/or family members, keep it in mind as you won't want to over complicate your letters nor data entry.

We do use it, but I'm not sure if we're using it the best way we can or just making more work, so I'd be interested in knowing how others use it before posting any advice.

Shelley Nappier 2 · September 2017

Judith Minder:

Ryan Hyde:

No, for estates we add an org record that looks like "Estate of Jane Doe" and we link that to the deceased constituent's record. The reason is that the estate is not the same as the deceased person, and we like to make sure that an individual, deceased or not, is not recognized as the estate. And that's partly to do with our annual audit as well - you can make the argument that RE should not be audited like this because it is not technically a financial database, but in reality, that's the way it works for lots of orgs, so best to dot your Ts and cross your Is (that's the way I said this phrase out loud this morning and I'm sticking to it)

However, just to be clear, whoever told you that you should create a new record for a deceased person even if the deceased person is already a constituent was just flat out wrong. That's not the way RE was ever intended to be used.

Ryan,

I believe I was directed that way thinking that it would result in estate gifts. Not all deceased individuals result in that. So then if we would be receiving estate gifts, it is best to make a separate account and link it to the individuals account. I guess I just see that as cumbersome, but if that is best practice so be it.

Judy

Hi Judy,

We do not make a seperate record. We "edit" the name in the addressee/salutation tab and have it read something like this "The Estate of ???", change the constitency code to Bequest. We also use the same process as Ryan described as far as Tributes are concerned. I also seen someone was asking about acknowledgment letters. I do not use the Tribute Letters. Instead I've added an additional letter to our list of acknowledgment letters which is available through Mail/Acknowledgment Letters/Mail Merge. I have added a cc at the bottom of the letter that captures the person to be notified of incoming gifts which is at the bottom of the tribute.

The tribute module is very time consuming to use.

Jill Freidmutter · September 2017

Hi Judith,

We are a hospice and memorial gifts are crucial to our fundraising efforts. We have the tribute module. We create a separate record for a deceased patient (even if we don't have donations in their memory) and their family relations (for invitations to events and future contact). If the deceased was a constituent, we will mark the record as deceased and add the tribute in the existing constituent record. (More complications if there is a surviving spouse...) And Andrew made a great point -- that acknowledgement letters (to the honoree or loved one of deceased) can be generated by gifts with tributes, as well as tribute thank you letters.

best, Jill

Heather MacKenzie · September 2017

Kinda lost track of who said exactly what in this very interesting thread, but I feel like no pointed out that thank you letters can pull information from tribute module tribute records, so there's no advantage or disadvantage, when it comes to the TY letters, to using the Tribute module or not (if you have it.)

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