LDS.org replacing MLS?

[drepouille]

I wish they would run that tool ONCE. Even though it came out many months ago, I am still finding ward clerks in my stake who say they have never heard of it. I've only been sending them messages about it every month...

[Gary_Miller]

Finance and membership information are controlled pretty carefully. A bishop may call someone as an Assistant Clerk–Membership because he doesn't want him working with finances, or vice-versa with the Assistant Clerk–Finance working on membership data. Without permission from the bishop,

I realize its the Bishops responsibility to determine who does what. However, I don't fully understand while there is a need to always bother the Bishop with permissions. The clerks working together are quite capable of managing the duties and permissions on their own.
While its important to have one clerk who is over all responsible for specific areas it equally important that there is someone else who can also step in and help out when needed. They do not have to be experts in all areas but should be able to do the basics that is needed.

For instance our membership clerk helps with the tithing and donations on Sunday if Finance Clerk or the Ward Clerk can't be there. However that's all he does everything else can usually wait until the regular clerk whose primary responsibility for finances returns.

Our assistant clerks also fill in for the Ward Clerk when it comes to meetings he should attend but may be gone. Such as Bishopric and Ward Council.

I wouldn't feel comfortable letting the membership clerk help with tithing

Why would you not feel comfortable if the person meets the requirements as set forth in the handbook (the only difference is they he should hold the Melchizedek Priesthood) and the person is trained to help out. Even though they may not do this on a regular bases there is always a Bishopric member who does to help them.

– though I assume you have permission in your ward.

We did not ask for permissions we just assumed that everyone should be able to help each other and other members when necessary. There was no reason to ask permission we just did it because its our responsibility.

I guess my point of view comes form Clerking in a Military Ward where we had to make sure we could fill in for each other because you never knew when someone maybe gone for any length of time.

[eblood66]

I guess my point of view comes form Clerking in a Military Ward where we had to make sure we could fill in for each other because you never knew when someone maybe gone for any length of time.

I think the lds.org permissions were selected based on the expectation that the Ward Clerk was sufficient backup for the more specialized assistant clerks. That is obviously not always the case but in many units it probably is. In the 7 years I've been ward clerk in our ward I can't remember a time when both the financial clerk and I were gone and couldn't handle donations.

I think they also applied the principle listed in the MLS help:

An MLS user should receive only those rights needed to perform his or her calling.

Even though the same standards of worthiness apply for all clerks if their calling doesn't require access to certain information then there is no reason for them to have permissions. It sounds perfectly reasonable in your situation to have all assistant clerks backup both specialties but that isn't always the case. Based on this principle I wouldn't expect the permissions to change for the specialized callings especially when there is a work around.

[zaneclark]

What is this "tool" you mention? I have been membership clerk for many years and regularly enter callings, preferably standard but occasionally I have to use a custom calling....and I have never heard of a "custom calling tool." What is its purpose and when would I use it?

[russellhltn]

Custom Position Review tool.

"With the release of MLS 3.0 there is now a Custom Position Review tool to review existing custom positions to see if there are standard positions that can be used in place of each custom position.

"Note: (MLS) Administrative rights are required to view this tool."