Want e-giving, but now using PowerChurch 8 and Quicken

[gindie]

We currently use PowerChurch Plus version 8. All contributions are in cash or check. I, as treasurer, get the contribution report after everything's been counted on Sunday morning and make one weekly entry of that giving into Quicken.

We already use Vanco for Direct Deposit of payroll. We'd like to explore their e-giving.

From the reading I have done, I suspect we would need upgrade to the latest PowerChurch. Then, the financial secretary can download the week's Vanco transactions on Sunday morning when she prepares the contribution report for me.

My concerns/questions are:

1) I understand Vanco makes daily deposits into the bank account as e-giving contributions roll in. I equate that to several additional Quicken entries during the week to keep in sync with the bank transactions.

2) Can PowerChurch produce a report showing only the imported Vanco transactions, for me to check against the intermittent Quicken entries I had been making during the week? And, in conjunction with this, can PowerChurch produce a report that only contains the checks and cash that were in the offering plates (and would therefore equate to that week's bank deposit)?

I'm showing my ignorance about PowerChurch here, but it would help me greatly in our decision about delving into e-giving.

Also, if there are any other ideas/tips out there from folks who have transitioned from a relatively archaic system to one with e-giving, I'd be interested in hearing them.

Thanks very much.

[NeilZ]

We currently use PowerChurch Plus version 8. All contributions are in cash or check. I, as treasurer, get the contribution report after everything's been counted on Sunday morning and make one weekly entry of that giving into Quicken.

We already use Vanco for Direct Deposit of payroll. We'd like to explore their e-giving.

From the reading I have done, I suspect we would need upgrade to the latest PowerChurch. Then, the financial secretary can download the week's Vanco transactions on Sunday morning when she prepares the contribution report for me.

Yes, version 8 is no longer supported, plus you're missing out on a lot of features that the upgraded versions have, such as Vanco transaction import.

My concerns/questions are:

1) I understand Vanco makes daily deposits into the bank account as e-giving contributions roll in. I equate that to several additional Quicken entries during the week to keep in sync with the bank transactions.

If you start using Powerchurch's Fund Accounting and move from Quicken, this would be done automatically when you Post Contributions. The system would create the proper deposit transaction for the proper day. Or, your

2) Can PowerChurch produce a report showing only the imported Vanco transactions, for me to check against the intermittent Quicken entries I had been making during the week? And, in conjunction with this, can PowerChurch produce a report that only contains the checks and cash that were in the offering plates (and would therefore equate to that week's bank deposit)?

Yes, as during the setup for Vanco import you select a 'Contribution Type' (I don't think v8 has this) of 'Online' or create a new type that means something to you. Then when creating the report, you can filter out what you want or don't want.

I'm showing my ignorance about PowerChurch here, but it would help me greatly in our decision about delving into e-giving.

Also, if there are any other ideas/tips out there from folks who have transitioned from a relatively archaic system to one with e-giving, I'd be interested in hearing them.

Thanks very much.

I have a few:

1. Because Powerchurch was designed as a CHURCH management system, it will have advantages over using Quicken for your books, since Quicken is really designed for personal use.

2. All transactions stay within the one program. When you do any financial transactions, Payroll, Accounts Payable, even CONTRIBUTIONS, the system creates the transactions and they are placed in an internal table for later posting to the main accounts. This eliminates any possible issues with missed transactions, deposits etc.

3. PAYROLL is very automatic, everything is done locally, even to printing the W2s if you want. However, you're using Vanco so I'm not sure if that is something you would want to use, or just have Vanco do the EFT for you.

4. You can have a copy of the program at the church and if you do your accounting at home, which is sounds like that's what you do, a copy at home just to do the accounting. You can have the Contributions posted by the financial secretary to a FILE, which can then be emailed to you for import into the accounting side of Powerchurch. When it is imported, the system will post everything to the proper accounts that you have setup. Its a no brainer and you don't have to do any manual entries.

My suggestion is to call Powerchurch to get some additional information, and also download a copy of the v11.55 demo, which is available here: https://www.powerchurch.com/demo/