Appendix 14

Software  

SOFTWARE                       

             Unfortunately, many people take on the job of managing church finances thinking that if they keep good records of all the money coming in, and all the money going out they will have done the job.  The naive volunteer may have used one of the excellent home finance software programs such as Quicken or Microsoft Money.  "This has made my life easy,"  they say.  "I could do this for the church."  These two programs are well designed and are loved by many of us for the job they do in personal finance management.

            Balancing your checkbook and keeping track of how you spent your money over the last six months is not the same as accounting for an organization however.  Many financial transactions do not involve the checking account, as we learned in Appendix 11 where we followed a few accounting transactions.  Suppose, for example, funds are set aside for a balloon payment on the mortgage or for eventual roof replacement.  Or, the board passes a policy requiring everyone with keys to the building to make a $5 deposit against possible loss.  These are situations that are not easily reflected with a simple checkbook entry and will necessarily be confusing if done in that format.  A report with several oddities of this sort prepared by the treasurer who “keeps everything on a spreadsheet” is soon unreadable and unreliable.

             It is instructive to consider why it is that Intuit sells Quickbooks and Quickbooks for Non-Profits as well as Quicken.  It is because full accounting for a small business or a United Way agency or a church is a fundamentally different task than keeping a checkbook.  The issue is not that it is a bigger job; it is a different job.  For those church treasurers who are trying to do church accounting with a checkbook program and a spreadsheet,  I strongly recommend change.  Use software designed for the job you are asked to do. 

             Software designed especially for use by churches can change substantially from year to year, so it is difficult to make generalizations about how one package compares to another; and, many people in church offices around the country are more familiar with software than I.  A good source for up-to-date advice on strengths and weaknesses of various packages (such as MemInfo which is designed specifically with UU churches in mind) is http://www.uua.org/mailman/listinfo/ChurchMgmtSoftware.