Failed Attempts to E-mail Contribution Statements

[TobyWilson]

Church staff has worked hard to prepare for the issuance of contribution statements via e-mail. All church members have been queried via mass e-mail regarding their willingness to accept electronic vs. paper statements. The response was positive with over 70 members agreeing to receive e-mailed statements. Staff has groomed the membership database to ensure that the "statement via e-mail" checkbox is appropriately checked or unchecked and that the contribution envelope number and e-mail address is also displayed on records which have the "statement via e-mail" checkbox checked. We also made sure the system was set up for e-mail by checking the system e-mail preferences and to ensure that the SMTP server address was correct. We clicked the "Test" button, got a "success" dialog and then issued a few test statements to ourselves (one at a time, i.e. "individual" statements vs. "all" statements). All tests were successful.

Today, we made our first attempt to issue the real quarterly statements en-mass via e-mail. We followed the standard method for producing the statements in PowerChurch except when we reached the screen that includes the e-mail option, we selected "E-mail Statements" and "Print Statements not E-mailed." We entered a subject on the next screen and provided a message within the body of the e-mail to which each statement would be an attachment. When we clicked the "Finish" button, the result was that we were taken back to the PowerChurch screen that was visible when we first selected "Reports:All Contribution Statements." We then checked our own e-mail boxes to see if statements had been received, and they had not. In frustration, we then printed all statements as we always have done, and that operation worked fine. Subsequently, we again attempted to issue the (70 or so) contribution statements via e-mail, this time selecting "E-mail only" rather than the option to e-mail plus print statements not e-mailed. This time, the system seemed to work and a status window appeared to show the progress being made. We then noticed the appearance of numerous error messages. We didn't know what any of them meant, and when the process ended, there was no error summary that we could print out and discuss among ourselves or with a tech support person. We did what we could do, which was to again check our own personal e-mail boxes to see what might be there. One person got nothing, as before. Another person got the e-mail with subject and text message. The attachment (statement), however, was unreadable. First, it was grayed out, very faint. Second, all characters were unrecognizable, as in "0(0((0...", etc. We're going back to the church tomorrow but are not sure what to try next. Any clues from tech support or PowerChurch users will be greatly appreciated.

[Zaphod]

Without a listing of those errors you saw, it's hard to know exactly what might be going on. This is kind of a shot in the dark, but try running netsetup9.exe from your PCPLUS9 directory.

Then, try to email an individual statement to see if that makes a difference. If that doesn't work, try this:

1) Rename the following folders:
C:\Windows\crystal to C:\Windows\crystal_old
C:\Program Files\Seagate Software to C:\Program Files\Seagate Software_old
C:\Program Files\Common Files\Crystal Decisions to C:\Program Files\Common Files\Crystal Decisions_old

2) From the PowerChurch program directory (typically C:\PowerChurch\PCPLUS9) find the "Install" directory.

3) Inside the Install directory, run the following files in this order:
pc9cr85.exe
pc9cr9.exe

Then, try your email again. This is a fix for a different, but related issue. It may fix your problem here. Either way, let us know.