Create an Effective Work Receipt Template for NPOs with Ease

Work receipt template for NPOs

i'm jeff posell the 10-minute treasurer with practical advice for improving your church's financial future in this video i'm going to talk about how you do a receipt for a non-cash donation most of you might not think this is an issue but there is a tension in what the irs's guidelines are and then what donors often expect so i'm just going to walk you through that so what are non-cash donations those are anything besides um checks and cash and electronic transfers they are stock donations actually this is the um the first non-cash gift i ever received was coca-cola stock so that was a cool gift um sometimes they leave you pianos churches seem to collect pianos that other people do not want and commodities is another great gift i mean if you're you have farmers and ranchers i think that's just a wonderful gift that they can give you a truckload of beans or a cow or whatever it is that is an awesome gift so those are examples of non-cash donations and one of the things this is where the tension comes in the donor will often want to write it off for taxes you know especially if it's a larger gift and a lot of times with non-cash donations they usually are a little bit larger so they'll want you to put a number on it that they can plug in for their taxes so they can itemize and that is one thing that you're not supposed to do um the irs guidelines are pretty clear on this and i'll have that in the description for this video a link to that uh but you are not supposed to value it that's about the same as giving tax advice so so what can you do so here is a template of a non-cash gift receipt that bruce bloomer and myself created several years ago trying to be totally in compliance with the irs but also um respectful and appreciative of the donor and i'll put a link for that in the description but there's really those three bullet pointed things that i'm going to talk through plus one extra and those are the things to be mindful of so the first thing is the description of the gift and you're going to want to be detailed enough here to where the donor or their tax accountant can value the gift you're not valuing it but they can use that information to come up with some kind of a value for stock it's pretty easy you know you'd list the number of shares and then the the the stock and usually i try to include the stock symbol so for example if i received 10 shares of coca-cola stock i would include the symbol which is kale which is kind of odd but anyway that's what i would do if it's something like um a commodity you know uh so if i received 10 bushels well 10 let's say a thousand bushels of wheat let's go bigger so if i received a thousand bushels of wheat i would want to say what kind of wheat it was you know and if there's any other details that i would need to value that wheat for what it would sell for same deal with the cow for pianos and those are the kind of items clothing you know you you do need to say give a description i received an upright piano whatever the if it's got a model on it and then you also want to make some kind of a declaration of of what condition it's in so if it's clothing you know slightly used or like new or new you know or well-worn you know whatever that would be same thing with the piano you want to make some kind of a declaration of what condition it was in so just be detailed enough to where a person could reasonably go and find out the the some kind of an estimate for the value the date received is also important because it helps in the valuation process often you know with the stock price you know you could say date received and sometimes again you can list the high and the low uh price for that day and that might be helpful but you don't have to but but the stocks commodities those will definitely change in value from day to day so the date is very important in valuing it um the you know other items like pianos and clothes their value might fluctuate a little bit but still it's good to list the exact day because you need that and then if there's any designation i i just think that's important period so that you're showing the donor respect this actually doesn't have to do anything with the irs you wouldn't have to include this for an irs compliant receipt but any designation so so if they donated close for the the rummage sale the church rummage sale just just include that or if and if the proceeds go anywhere from the sale so if it goes to the youth mission trip just go ahead and put that there it's a good reminder for everybody that you gave this and this is what it's going for so it it shows the donor respect and this one you do need to have in order to stay in compliance with the irs is you need that statement that says they didn't receive any goods or services in return for their contribution other than intangible religious benefits include something very similar to that and of course if they did receive something that that doesn't negate their gift you know so let's just say they sold you a car at a sweetheart deal so they they gave you a three thousand dollar car for 500 bucks you know just disclose that they received uh other than the 500 they did not receive any other goods and services in return for the contribution uh other than intangible religious benefits so that would be a way to get through that and that's it that's not too tough um i will include again in the description a link to that template that bruce and i put together as well as a link to bruce bloomer's site he does some consulting services so that might be helpful as well as a link to the irs's um official guidance on this subject so i hope that helps and again this is the ministry of the finance office of the dakotas conference of the united methodist church as well as the dakotas united methodist foundation find all of our stuff online and i hope this blesses you so all right till next time