One vs Two accounting funds

[karen.cccw]

We are a small church, and our previous bookkeeper was using Quickbooks for Accounting, and Excel to track weekly contributions and their designation (tithe, missions, building). I am the new bookkeeper and we decided to purchase Powerchurch. I am a new Powerchurch user and have setup everything, watched the training videos, etc. One thing I am unclear on is the need for multiple accounting funds.

The prior bookkeeper opened 3 bank accounts (general fund/tithes, missions, building) only because she had no way to track the individual designation amounts in Quickbooks. Before I setup two additional accounting funds in PC, I want to confirm they are really necessary. Can't all this be tracked in the one Accounting Fund, by just adding all three individual accounts as Assets? Am I missing something?

Not to complicate things but we likely will be changing banks in 90 days, and have considered consolidating everything back to one bank account now that we have PC. Any pros/cons on this approach?

Thanks in advance!
Karen

[NeilZ]

We are a small church, and our previous bookkeeper was using Quickbooks for Accounting, and Excel to track weekly contributions and their designation (tithe, missions, building). I am the new bookkeeper and we decided to purchase Powerchurch. I am a new Powerchurch user and have setup everything, watched the training videos, etc. One thing I am unclear on is the need for multiple accounting funds.

The prior bookkeeper opened 3 bank accounts (general fund/tithes, missions, building) only because she had no way to track the individual designation amounts in Quickbooks. Before I setup two additional accounting funds in PC, I want to confirm they are really necessary. Can't all this be tracked in the one Accounting Fund, by just adding all three individual accounts as Assets? Am I missing something?

Not to complicate things but we likely will be changing banks in 90 days, and have considered consolidating everything back to one bank account now that we have PC. Any pros/cons on this approach?

Thanks in advance!
Karen

Karen,

no .. you can use ONE primary checking account to track the 3 different accounting funds. The system will properly account for all funds, and you'll only have one checking account to reconcile.

You will need to have the one checking account, normally the 1110-000 account, in each accounting fund. Then just have the vendor setup to point to the right accounting fund when you write checks.

[sgbani]

Just to add a few thoughts to the topic.

Nearly 20 years ago, when we started using PC+, someone thought it was a good idea to have a bunch of accounting funds.
our church is small, only has one checking account, but have over a dozen accounting funds that use it (cue eyeroll).
Specifically, our powerchurch checking account number is XX-1120-000, where the XX represents the accounting fund.

So, not how I would have done the chart of accounts, but apparently that is how it has been for a long time at our church, even before we had PC+.

[NeilZ]

Just to add a few thoughts to the topic.

Nearly 20 years ago, when we started using PC+, someone thought it was a good idea to have a bunch of accounting funds.
our church is small, only has one checking account, but have over a dozen accounting funds that use it (cue eyeroll).
Specifically, our powerchurch checking account number is XX-1120-000, where the XX represents the accounting fund.

So, not how I would have done the chart of accounts, but apparently that is how it has been for a long time at our church, even before we had PC+.

I would only have a separate accounting fund for things that are really NOT in the operating budget, such as Building Fund donations, if the Building Fund is used as a reserve for major repairs, or for future buildings.

Most everything else can be done using Donor Restrictions from within operations. Also, the default checking account in PCPlus is 1110-000, that is the one used by Accounting Setup.