BP 11122023 129pm - Flipbook - Page 47
Accounting for Restricted Donations
Fundraising and Ministry Funds
February 2022
This document has been compiled to assist those parishes and schools in understanding donation
accounting in relationship to revenue and liability/exchange account usage. The simplest way to
determine if a donation belongs on the statement of activity as revenue or on the statement of
financial position as a liability exchange account is to determine if the funds benefit the
parish/school directly or another organization. We highly recommend accounting for transactions
as detailed below and ask the Archbishop and CFO for assessment exclusion, as necessary. Your
parishioners deserve full transparency for their donations acknowledgment on donation
statements. Fundraising is not included in donation statements as the individual receives
something for the donation/payment. Below is a chart detailing how each of these types of funds
should be accounted:
Donation/collection Type
Donation/fundraising collected for another organization
Parishioner Donation for parish or pastor benefit
Fundraising/Ministry group pays for something to benefit the
parish/school
Fundraising/ ministry group to pay for their own activity
Liability or Revenue
Liability
Revenue
Revenue
Liability
To explain this chart in more detail and give examples of each with the corresponding
accounting, please see details below:
Donation for Other Organizations
Donation of funds: Many parishes and schools collect for other organizations. The most
common of these organizations is the local Saint Vincent de Paul, Habitat for Humanity,
Pregnancy Aid Centers, disaster relief, parishioner hardships, sister parishes in other countries,
etc. These collections are recorded just like the Archdiocesan second collections as a liability
until remitted to the organization.
Fundraising: Parishes fundraise for other organizations. Here are 3 examples:
1. A parish hosts an annual golf tournament to benefit various other local charities in the
community. 100% of the net proceeds are paid out to other local organizations and thus
the event is correctly accounted for in a liability account.
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