Church Edition

Count Sunday's offering once and it becomes the bank deposit, the fund balances and every household's giving record. Take gifts online, track pledge campaigns, send IRS-compliant giving statements in one run, and handle the minister's housing allowance paperwork — all on proper double-entry books.

Turning On the Edition

Included on the Pro tier and above and on every Nonprofit plan — there's no add-on fee and no per-member charge. The ⛪ Church entry appears in the top navigation when your license qualifies, and in the sidebar once you've counted your first offering (or if your company's industry looks like a church). Not seeing it? Check your tier in 🔐 System Admin.

Members and Envelopes

A member in BizBooks Pro is a giving household, not an individual — "John & Mary Smith" gets one record, one envelope number and one year-end statement. Open ⛪ Church → Members and click + Member:

• Household name — exactly as it should appear on the statement.
• Envelope # — optional, but counters can find a household by number, and it prints on the count sheet. Each active member's number must be unique.
• Household members — a free-text list ("John, Mary, Emma") so the office knows who's included.
• Status — member, regular attender, visitor or inactive. This is for your own lists; it never affects giving records.
• Statement delivery — email or print. Anyone without an email address is set to print automatically.

The members list shows each household's giving for the year and the date of their last gift. Click giving on any row for their full history, or + gift to record one.

Funds and Restricted Giving

Four funds are created the first time you open the edition: General Fund, Building Fund, Missions and Benevolence. Each one posts to its own income account, so the income statement shows giving by purpose without any extra work.

The three designated funds are restricted. A restricted fund carries a donor restriction, which means gifts to it appear in the "with donor restrictions" column of your Statement of Activities and stay there until you spend the money on that purpose and release it from ⚙️ Donor-Restricted Funds. That is what FASB ASC 958 asks of you, and it's the difference between saying the building money is separate and being able to show it.

Add a fund under Funds → + Fund. Tick Donor-restricted if gifts may only be spent on that purpose; leave it clear for things like a general memorial fund the board can direct. BizBooks creates the income account for you.

Counting an Offering

This is the heart of the edition. After the service, click + Count an Offering:

1. Set the service date, a description if you run more than one service, and the bank account the deposit goes to.
2. Enter both counters' names. Two unrelated people counting together is the standard control, and both names print on the count sheet for signature.
3. Add a line per gift: member, fund, method (cash or check), check number, amount. A household splitting a gift across two funds is simply two lines.
4. Enter loose plate cash — the cash with no envelope — and choose which fund it belongs to. It joins the deposit but appears on nobody's statement, because you can't substantiate an anonymous gift.
5. Watch the totals: currency and coin, checks, the deposit total, and a running total per fund. Compare them with what's physically on the table.
6. Save for later if the count isn't final, or Save & Post when it is.

Posting writes one deposit line per restriction group (unrestricted gifts together, each restricted fund separately, so the fund reporting stays honest), credits each fund's income account, and adds every gift to its household's giving record. Print the count sheet for the counters to sign and file.

Gifts Between Sundays

For a mailed check, a bank transfer or a stock gift, use + Single Gift: member, fund, amount, date, method and the account it was deposited to. It posts immediately and counts toward the member's statement exactly like an offering gift.

Online Giving

The Online Giving tab gives your church its own giving page — a link and a QR code you can put in the bulletin — where members give by card or bank transfer, once or monthly.

How it's put together

Payments run through your own Stripe account, so money goes straight to your bank and the fees are Stripe's standard rates, with nothing added by us. Connect Stripe in ⚙️ Company Settings → Payment Gateway first. Your Stripe keys never leave your computer: BizBooks creates the payment links, and the giving page simply sends the giver to Stripe's secure checkout.

Setting it up

1. Choose your page address — the part after /give/. Short and memorable, because it goes in print.
2. Write a headline and a sentence of thanks.
3. Set suggested amounts (each becomes a button) and decide whether to offer monthly giving, an "other amount" option, and the chance for givers to cover the processing fee.
4. Tick the funds that should appear. Most churches show General, Building and Missions, and leave Benevolence off.
5. Click Publish giving page. BizBooks creates a Stripe payment link for every fund and amount combination, then puts your page online. It takes a minute the first time.

Gifts coming back

Because BizBooks runs on your computer rather than in the cloud, it collects gifts from Stripe rather than being notified instantly. It checks automatically every half hour while the program is open, and Check for new gifts does it on demand. Each gift posts to its fund, records the Stripe fee as an expense, and lands on the giver's year-end statement.

When a gift arrives from an email address that doesn't match a member, BizBooks creates a household and flags it new member? rather than guessing. Click match to member to move it onto the right household (the placeholder disappears), or it's new to keep it.

Recurring gifts

Click Load from Stripe on the Recurring gifts card to see who gives monthly, how much, and when the next charge falls. Anything failing — an expired card, usually — is listed separately so the office can call. You can cancel a recurring gift from here, and if you turn on Stripe's customer portal and paste its login link into the settings, givers can manage their own.

Pledges

Record a commitment under Pledges → + Pledge: household, fund, campaign name, total pledged and the period it covers. Progress counts that household's gifts to that fund between those dates — nothing to keep up to date by hand.

Each pledge shows the percentage given and whether it's on track for how far through the period you are, and campaign totals appear at the top of the tab. A pledge that goes unpaid can be cancelled; it stays visible for the record.

Year-End Giving Statements

Open Giving Statements and pick the tax year. You'll see every household with a gift that year, what they gave, how many gifts, their delivery preference, and whether a statement has already gone out.

Each statement lists every gift with its date and fund, and carries the wording IRC §170(f)(8) requires — including the "no goods or services were provided … other than intangible religious benefits" language that applies to churches. Where a giver received something in return (a fundraising dinner, say), the statement shows its value and the deductible balance. Non-cash gifts are described but never valued, because assigning a value is the donor's responsibility, not yours.

• Email statements sends to everyone set to email who hasn't had one yet, and lists anyone set to print.
• view / print on a row opens that household's statement as a PDF.
• Re-running the batch never double-sends — already-sent statements are skipped.

Minister's Housing Allowance

Under IRC §107, a minister may exclude a housing allowance from income — but only if the church designates it in advance. Open Housing Allowance → + Designate Allowance and record the minister, the tax year, the amount, the date of the board resolution and whether they own, rent or live in a parsonage.

Two documents come out of it:

• Resolution — the formal designation for your board minutes.
• Statement — the year-end letter for the minister's own tax records and W-2 box 14.

Enter what was actually paid during the year and, when the minister reports them, their actual housing costs and the fair rental value of the home plus utilities. BizBooks shows the estimated excludable amount — the lowest of the three — and any taxable excess.

Reports

The Overview tab answers what a finance committee usually asks:

• Giving to date against the same period last year, with the percentage change.
• A month-by-month comparison of this year and last.
• Giving by fund, including loose plate cash, for any date range.
• The number of giving households and the average gift per household.
• Gave last year, not yet this year — a follow-up list for the pastor, not a collections list.

Everything else in BizBooks Pro applies on top: budgets against actual giving, the FASB ASC 958 Statement of Activities and Statement of Financial Position, bank reconciliation, bill payment and payroll import.