Store Rebate/Credit

[Jesus Rules]

We received a rebate from Menards, which is like a store credit. The money never goes back into our bank account. We are trying to use PC to show everything we do. How would we input this rebate? It never goes into our bank account but is used like cash in the store. I was going to add another account into our chart of accounts but I wasn't sure how to set it up. I thought about linking it to our Maintenance account instead of the bank, would that work?

[NeilZ]

We received a rebate from Menards, which is like a store credit. The money never goes back into our bank account. We are trying to use PC to show everything we do. How would we input this rebate? It never goes into our bank account but is used like cash in the store. I was going to add another account into our chart of accounts but I wasn't sure how to set it up. I thought about linking it to our Maintenance account instead of the bank, would that work?

Its a much better idea to setup a LIABILITY account for the credit card. This will enable you to maintain such credit card balances, as well as 'return' the funds to the expense account where they were originally spent.

This would be a LIABILITY account, in Powerchurch normally the 2000 series accounts, where you also have items the church has a liability to pay out on a regular basis such as Federal and state income tax, Social Security withholding, etc.

The account would be setup in the Operations account, which is what is normally used for day to day purchases. I'm not sure what you mean by linking to the Maintenance account instead of the bank.

So lets say the card is setup as 01-2550-000 Menard Credit Card, the first thing you would need to do is create a Funds Accounting transaction to account for the refund. We'll assume that it was purchased under expense account 5619-000, so that transaction would look like this in Fund Accounting -> Enter Transaction:

01-2550-000 Menard Credit Card DB 25.00
01-5619-000 Some Ministry Exp CR 25.00

This 'returns' the funds to the expense account which reduces the account spending for the year and accurately reflects actual spending. It also adds the 25.00 to the Liability Account, which will show a NEGATIVE balance as you have a negative balance on the credit card statement which reflects the credit.

Now, whenever someone purchases something on that credit card for a ministry, they should give you the receipt so you can properly record it under the correct ministry to reflect their spending, as well as to reflect the liability you have to Menard's.

You do this through Accounts Payable by creating a MANUAL CHECK. You would enter the Vendor (obviously Menard's) and for the CRedit account line instead of using the normal Bank (Checking) account you would use the liability account of 01-2550-000. The DeBit account would be the expense account for that ministry. Once that's done, you would save the manual check, and post AP as normal.

When the Credit Card statement comes in, you would do a RECONCILIATION just like you do with the bank statement, however, instead of using account 1110 (normal checking account) you would enter 2550 as the account to reconcile.

After that initial setup, and transaction entry, I would do a reconciliation after you post Funds Accounting. This reconciliation will only reflect the credit on the Menard's statement, but will have the system setup for the next month's statement which, I'm guessing, will have more purchases.

Does this help?

[Jesus Rules]

It is not linked to the credit card either. Menards has a rebate thing going on, store wide. You send in the form with the receipt and they send you a "card" in the mail with a credit. You can only use this at Menards and it spends like cash.
The Maintenance part is just the section title in our chart of accounts, it covers all our maintenance at the church and parsonage.

[NeilZ]

It is not linked to the credit card either. Menards has a rebate thing going on, store wide. You send in the form with the receipt and they send you a "card" in the mail with a credit. You can only use this at Menards and it spends like cash.
The Maintenance part is just the section title in our chart of accounts, it covers all our maintenance at the church and parsonage.

Then you have to class it as Income, and still enter it via a Fund Accounting transaction

I'm fairly sure this will work (I'd do a backup then enter it to verify, if it doesn't look right you can restore from the backup)

01-2551-000 Menard Rebate Cd DB 25.00
01-4188-000 Miscellaneous Inc CR 25.00

Then when you spend it you would enter the following via AP Manual Check

01-2551-000 Menard Rebate Cd CR 25.00
01-2550-000 Menard CC CR 15.00
01-5325-000 Some Expense DB 40.00

[Jesus Rules]

Thank you!! I'll try that.