User Support Forum

I am taking over as treasurer for our church and I am new to PowerChurch. We have just started a new year, and I am trying to reconcile our opening balances and finding out there were numerous errors made in the past. I am wondering if it is possible to make an entire new set of accounts and start using them by entering the beginning balances from our auditor. My concern is the contribution module and all the history that has been accumulated using this over the past years. There was also five funds set up but looks like only one was ever used. I would also like to redo the funds and move forward with more detail and also use the software to its full extent. Any advice or help is greatly appreciated.

If you RESTART Accounting, and redo your chart-of-accounts in Fund Accounting, you will not lose any history in your Contributions module.

I recommend you do that, and rebuild your Fund structure and chart-of-accounts in Fund Accounting to meet your current situation.

Make a backup first!!

Thank you,

How about the prior acccount activity report. Will that detail be lost if I restart accounting?

Yes. Everything in Fund Accounting will lose its history.

Can we start a new database library to retain all the old information? Call the new one our "church name2014", indicating the year we started with the new chart of accounts? I think it will be faster to add new set of accounts, then to try and correct the errors made in the past. If I am way off, please let me know.

What I would do is to copy the entire current PowerChurch folder to a new folder called "2013 PC Archive" or something you are comfortable with. Then you will have access to the entire old database if you should need it. I do this at the end of every year so that if I should ever have to delete any old data I will still have access to it in the future.

John is correct about Contributions.

There is much confusion about the relationship between the Contributions Database and the Accounting Database. A Contribution Fund does not equate to a Fund Accounting Fund. Two different things.

Contributions and Funds Accounting are Two Separate Modules and Databases. There is really no DIRECT interaction between them, other than when Contributions are posted over to Funds Accounting, and when you are setting up a new Contribution Fund. The setup routine just reads the Chart of Accounts so you can select the correct accounts to debit & credit.

When you Post Contributions to Funds Accounting, it simply calls a routine that creates a transaction and places it in the Unposted Transaction Queue of Funds Accounting using the account numbers that were located previously.

However, if you're going to restart accounting, then you're going to have to revisit the Contribution Fund setup module to adjust the Contribution Funds to point to the new accounts you've setup.