PowerChurch Software Newsletter - Year End 2019 Part 1

Welcome to the first of two year-end 2019 newsletters. In this issue, we're highlighting another new feature in Version 12.2, revisiting some year-end greatest hits, and announcing the year-end Maintenance Release round-up for Versions 11.55 and 12.2.

Version 12.2 - Reverse & Correct Contributions

A contribution was entered for $100, when in reality, it was only a $10 contribution. While the contributions are still unposted, you can easily make this change on the Modify Unposted Contributions screen. However, once they have been posted, it would require that you reverse the original contribution, then enter a new contribution for the correct amount.

Prior to Version 11, to reverse a contribution, you would go to Contributions > Enter Contributions and re-enter the original contribution with a negative dollar amount. All fields aside from the amount would have to match exactly, otherwise, you risked the original and the reversal showing up on the person's Contribution Statement.

Version 11 added a Reverse button on the View Posted Contributions screen, which would automatically create the negative entry for you to exactly match the original.

Now in Version 12.2, the Reverse button has been changed to Reverse/Correct. The reversing entry is still created for you automatically, but also, you are taken to a screen with the correcting entry already in progress. All you have to do is change the field(s) that were the problem. In the example above, this would be the amount. Change the $100 amount to $10 and click Save.

This combined with the addition of the Maintain Donors screen in Version 12.2, which also shows unposted transactions, has made the process of correcting data entry errors in Contributions quicker and easier than ever, while still maintaining the integrity of uneditable audit trail that is the foundation PowerChurch is built upon.

Year-End Resources Page

In prior years, we published articles and reminders specific to year-end processes and support in these year-end editions of the newsletter. There is now a dedicated page on our website at https://www.powerchurch.com/yearend where you can find links to those articles and other articles pertinent to year-end, such as support traffic and tax filing info.

Versions 11.55 and 12.2 Maintenance Releases

We have published sizeable Maintenance Release updates for both Versions 11.55 and 12.2. These both contain many bug fixes, feature tweaks, and the updated tax forms for 2019 filings. Our "Substitute Black and White" W2 and W3 forms have been approved by the Social Security Administration and the electronic filing standards tests have all been passed.

PowerChurch Online users automatically received the Version 12.2 Maintenance Release. For users of the desktop PowerChurch Plus Versions 11.55 and 12.2, you can subscribe to receive email notifications as soon as new Maintenance Releases are available, manually download the update from under Help > Download Maintenance Release, or just wait for the software to check for updates on its own, which happens every seven days.

Forum Q & A

The Support Forum on our website is a very active online community of our users and Tech Support staff members. There you can browse through thousands of questions and answers, or post your own.

From General:
Q. I want to run PowerChurch on two computers using OneDrive. The only objection I have seen here is that OneDrive is not a good idea because it is "cloud based". The two computers are locally networked. Is there an easier way?
A. Just use one computer as the server and the other as the client. Follow the directions here: https://www.powerchurch.com/networking. Using cloud storage services like OneDrive to share PowerChurch will eventually corrupt the database. The only safe way to use cloud storage is to share PowerChurch's zip file backups.

From Accounting:
Q. I need to void a check but when I go to the option and put in the check number it says that check is not found. However, it is in the list of checks written, just not in numerical order. It is at the top of the page.
A. There may be a space before the beginning of the check number. This could happen if it was a manual check. Try entering a space before the check number to see if that pulls up the check.

From Contributions:
Q. My contribution reports are printing whole dollars instead of dollars.cents. How can I change this? It seems to affect all reports.
A. This is a local Windows setting, found under Regional and Language Options. Change both Currency and Numbers to have two decimal places.