Moved Out Members & Tithing Statements

Discussions around using and interfacing with the Church MLS program.
daverich-p40
New Member
Posts: 8
Joined: Sun Mar 02, 2008 10:49 am

Moved Out Members & Tithing Statements

#1

Post by daverich-p40 »

This Feature Request is something I meant to post last year during Tithing Settlement. Yes, we have started the process already.

It would be very helpful if MLS was to keep a record of the "moved-out" or new addresses so that at the end of the year the Tithing statements could be mailed to those members without having to involve multiple government agencies.

The issue this year is compounded in that we have had 3 membership clerks in one year and the first two were less than committed - so records or possible correlation is not likely.

I would like to ask how others are solving this issue currently..?
User avatar
aebrown
Community Administrator
Posts: 15153
Joined: Tue Nov 27, 2007 8:48 pm
Location: Draper, Utah

#2

Post by aebrown »

Dave _R wrote:This Feature Request is something I meant to post last year during Tithing Settlement. Yes, we have started the process already.

It would be very helpful if MLS was to keep a record of the "moved-out" or new addresses so that at the end of the year the Tithing statements could be mailed to those members without having to involve multiple government agencies.

The issue this year is compounded in that we have had 3 membership clerks in one year and the first two were less than committed - so records or possible correlation is not likely.

I would like to ask how others are solving this issue currently..?
There is no requirement for you to find all those people. Members who have moved out have the responsibility to request their donation statements (or to leave their new address with the financial clerk as they leave).

See this post (and the entire thread) for more details.
User avatar
ericb
Member
Posts: 109
Joined: Fri Feb 23, 2007 8:51 am
Location: Vancouver USA

Making reasonable efforts to get members their financial statements

#3

Post by ericb »

Alan_Brown wrote:There is no requirement for you to find all those people. Members who have moved out have the responsibility to request their donation statements (or to leave their new address with the financial clerk as they leave).

See this post (and the entire thread) for more details.

If a member has left their new address information with the membership clerk, why would they expect they need to contact the financial clerk to get their statement? I wouldn't, and I'm a ward clerk -- I think this is one of those cases we need to put ourselves in the shoes of members, who generally don't think like members of these forums :). IMHO, if a member made the effort to donate funds to the church, we can make reasonable (unsolicited) efforts to get them their statement.

There may be the case where the member has moved more than once during the year, but if we don't hear word from them by end of January, is there harm in just mailing them their statement? It seems this is of more service to the member than just stashing their statement in a drawer. If I'm off base on church policy here, please let me know.

As for our ward, I've asking our membership clerk to assist the financial clerk in mailing statements to members that have moved. This won't be much of a problem for those that have left their address info, but will be an issue for records pulled. Going back to the original post, it would be very helpful if the MLS transaction report could simply indicated the new address of a pulled membership record, which the membership clerk could file for later reference.

btw - I read the other thread, which appears to have drifted from the basic issue at hand.
User avatar
aebrown
Community Administrator
Posts: 15153
Joined: Tue Nov 27, 2007 8:48 pm
Location: Draper, Utah

#4

Post by aebrown »

ericb wrote:If a member has left their new address information with the membership clerk, why would they expect they need to contact the financial clerk to get their statement?

They shouldn't expect that. I was only talking about the situation where the member doesn't leave their address at all; I apologize if that wasn't clear.

If a member leaves their new address with any part of the clerking staff, that should be sufficient. Hopefully the ward clerk is managing processes so that such information flows to any assistant clerk who needs to know it. And then if the financial clerk has the address, they should send the statement.
larq
New Member
Posts: 15
Joined: Thu Jun 26, 2008 3:27 pm
Location: USA

#5

Post by larq »

ericb wrote:There may be the case where the member has moved more than once during the year, but if we don't hear word from them by end of January, is there harm in just mailing them their statement? It seems this is of more service to the member than just stashing their statement in a drawer. If I'm off base on church policy here, please let me know.

The Tithing Settlement training lessonsays (on slide 27):
The clerk should deliver the tax-valid statements to donors by January thirty-first. If the donor has moved from the ward, the clerk should try to obtain the new address and mail the receipt.

So I think you're right that you should mail statements if you reasonably can. I think that other thread was simply making the point that clerks don't have to make huge efforts to track down members who moved out and didn't leave any address -- they bear some responsibility, too.
User avatar
Mikerowaved
Community Moderators
Posts: 4734
Joined: Sun Dec 23, 2007 12:56 am
Location: Layton, UT

#6

Post by Mikerowaved »

If I don't know a member's new address, I simply mail their statement to their old address with a note to the postmaster to please forward. Many of these I never see again, so I have to assume they were delivered. A few come back, so after checking with the RS Pres for a new address, (who always seems to know more about these things that we do ;) ), I archive them with the other financial data.
So we can better help you, please edit your Profile to include your general location.
greggo
Member
Posts: 286
Joined: Thu Jan 24, 2008 9:36 am
Location: Battle Creek, MI

#7

Post by greggo »

I'll reiterate what I stated in a previous thread that it would be great if MLS would automatically update the donors address when they are moved from the ward. That way we would at least have addresses for those that we moved out (as opposed to those that were requested from the new ward).
gdbrown-p40
New Member
Posts: 10
Joined: Thu Oct 16, 2008 10:01 pm
Location: Hillsboro, OR, USA

Year End Reports for Moved members

#8

Post by gdbrown-p40 »

When I was a finance clerk and learned of a members intention to move I gave them a donation envelope and requested that "IF" they wanted me to send them a donation statement at the end of the year, they were to use the envelope to send their new address to the Bishop. Many just requested a YTD statement at that time.:cool:
Gene Brown
Brookwood Ward
Hillsboro, OR
JackChristensen
New Member
Posts: 5
Joined: Tue Mar 18, 2008 6:28 am

#9

Post by JackChristensen »

So, how do you print end-of-year statement (for tax purposes) for ward members who've moved out of the ward during the year and have status "out of unit"?
User avatar
aebrown
Community Administrator
Posts: 15153
Joined: Tue Nov 27, 2007 8:48 pm
Location: Draper, Utah

#10

Post by aebrown »

JackChristensen wrote:So, how do you print end-of-year statement (for tax purposes) for ward members who've moved out of the ward during the year and have status "out of unit"?
MLS will print an Official Tax Statement for any donor. All donors will show up in the list of donors when you go to print the Official Tax Statement, whether they are in the ward or not. Just make sure that the "Show Donors" dropdown is set to "All" or "not members of this unit" -- if it is set to "Members of this unit" you clearly won't see any Out-of-unit donors.

As a refresher, you print these statements by going to Finances > Tithing Settlement > Donor Statements. Select the Type of Report to be Official Tax Statements (for the right country and with letterhead). Make sure you have the right Fiscal Year selected, and that the Show Donors filter is set correctly. If you want to include donors with a zero amount, check that check box. If you want to group by Household, check that box. Select all the donors you want to print statements for (use the Select All button if you want to print them all at once). Then click the Print button.
Locked

Return to “MLS Support, Help, and Feedback”