User Support Forum

I created a new income account for our "Unite" youth event. I have a "Unite" youth expense account as well. When contributions come in for this event, I submit them to the contribution fund 17 (Unite). My question is, how does that money get spent or sent to the expense account? When invoices come in for the event, I'm taking money from the expense account, but how do I increase that expense account with the contributions coming in? Should I be using the automatic transfer option in the contribution fund setup? The Unite fund was budgeted at $3,000. Is this preventing me from accomplishing what I need? The youth minister asked me to move his annual budget into categories, with Unite being one of them. So I set it up and budgeted the 3k he asked me to. Any help or advice on how to make this work is appreciated.

Classicaltutor wrote: ↑

Tue Feb 28, 2023 4:55 pm

I created a new income account for our "Unite" youth event. I have a "Unite" youth expense account as well. When contributions come in for this event, I submit them to the contribution fund 17 (Unite). My question is, how does that money get spent or sent to the expense account? When invoices come in for the event, I'm taking money from the expense account, but how do I increase that expense account with the contributions coming in? Should I be using the automatic transfer option in the contribution fund setup? The Unite fund was budgeted at $3,000. Is this preventing me from accomplishing what I need? The youth minister asked me to move his annual budget into categories, with Unite being one of them. So I set it up and budgeted the 3k he asked me to. Any help or advice on how to make this work is appreciated.

1st: You don't 'submit' anything to the contribution account. The contribution fund SHOULD be pointing at the income account and the checking account if it is setup properly. This allows the Contribution module to create the proper transaction when posting to Fund Accounting. This has nothing to do with any 'automatic transfer'.

2nd: you don't 'increase' an expense account. You only debit it when something is purchased.

The budget should have been setup using the operating fund in the first place, the income for Unite from contributions goes in to the general fund. If the contributions should only be used for funding UNITE, then you should have created a temp restricted account. Then when you purchase items for Unite you would RELEASE those funds to the general fund to cover that purchase.

The way you have it setup is OK, but its not segregating the funds, but you will know how much income is being generated for the Unite event. Just make sure that the Contribution fund is setup to point to the right income account.

Thanks for the reply.
Currently, the contribution fund is set up as follows:

Debit 01-1110-000 BANK
Credit 01-4880-000 UNITE

Is that correct? So I will never take money from the general fund(that the Unite income has been sent to) and re-up the balance of the Unite expense account. How do I replenish or use the money in the Unite contribution fund for youth now that it's all in the General Contributions?

When camp comes around is it better for me to structure it this way:

01-3830-000 Youth Equity Acct
01-4830-000 Youth Income
01-5830-000 Youth Expense

Then the income from camp registrations etc., can be in a single place reserved for camp expenses and used solely for camp?
I am not an accountant. I have only used this program for 6 months, and am trying to teach myself accounting 101 as I go.

Classicaltutor wrote: ↑

Wed Mar 01, 2023 11:23 am

Thanks for the reply.
Currently, the contribution fund is set up as follows:

Debit 01-1110-000 BANK
Credit 01-4880-000 UNITE

Is that correct? So I will never take money from the general fund(that the Unite income has been sent to) and re-up the balance of the Unite expense account. How do I replenish or use the money in the Unite contribution fund for youth now that it's all in the General Contributions?

It is correct if you setup that Income account using the "Maintain List of Donor Restrictions" .. this requires you to create a separate Fund Balance (net assets) account. If you just created that income account and did not go through the "Donor Restrictions' setup, those funds will just wind up in the general fund balance. The good news is that you can go into the Donor Restrictions setup to use that income account by checking the 'use existing account' box. Not knowing what version of PCPlus you're using, I would head to the Reference Guide by heading to the HELP menu, and select the Powerchurch Manual (PDF) from that list. The instructions on how to setup the Donor Restriction for v14 starts on page 228. Review them, then go and add the restriction. I suspect you'll have to add the Unite Fund Balance (Net Asset) account. Any expense account is optional, but you will need to create the release account.

When camp comes around is it better for me to structure it this way:

01-3830-000 Youth Equity Acct
01-4830-000 Youth Income
01-5830-000 Youth Expense

Then the income from camp registrations etc., can be in a single place reserved for camp expenses and used solely for camp?
I am not an accountant. I have only used this program for 6 months, and am trying to teach myself accounting 101 as I go.

You should create another Donor Restriction in much the same way as that you will do for Unite.

Then when you write checks to pay for items bought for Unite (or in the future youth camp) you will create the check ( "Maintain Open Invoices") as normal in Accounts Payable, then click on the button on the bottom of the "Maintain Open Invoices" window that says Release Restricted Funds. You'd select the correct donor restriction to use, verify the amount that is to be released (taken from the Invoice) and click on the Finish button.

I also suggest that your church may want to invest in the online training videos available for Accounting on Powerchurch.com, as they are buy once, access forever so if you need to review or a new person needs instruction, they are still available for your use.