In order to be able to manage the finances of a church, the bookkeeper may also need to act as an accountant or treasurer. They are responsible for all financial aspects of the church. These are their responsibilities, but not only.
Even if you have a church member who is a certified accountant or bookkeeper, hiring a specialist for your church's bookkeeping needs will likely be a large investment. We recommend that you make this an important priority. Three ways that investing in your church will benefit you are:
So why consider outsourcing? For some smaller to medium-sized churches, having an outsourced bookkeeper can increase expertise & accuracy, lower bookkeeping costs, and provide a missing link in internal controls. Let’s take a look at these one-by-one:
Set up a church bookkeeping system that not only tracks expenses and income, but also tracks your assets and liabilities.
When reconciling your bank statements and your credit card statements, you'll find errors such duplicates and missing transactions, bank errors in rare instances, and amount discrepancies.
We believe that everyone should be able make financial decisions with confidence. Our site does not feature every company or product on the financial market. However, we are proud of the fact that the advice we provide, the information we provide, and the tools and resources we create are objective, independent and straightforward.
While you focus on getting to know your community and growing your organization, we'll work to make the accounting function easy and ensure that your financial records are maintained correctly and accurately.
Here is a quick breakdown of some of the most common tasks you will need to accomplish when doing your church bookkeeping.
Enter Income And Expenses. ...
Track Contributions And Prepare Bank Deposits. ...
Pay Bills. ...
Journal Entries. ...
Complete A Bank Reconciliation.
seven years
Financial Records are traditionally kept for seven years. This relates to the laws of tax audits and the number of years back the IRS is allowed to look when determining an organization's tax liability.
Churches and religious nonprofits must maintain highly accurate accounting and bookkeeping records in order to maintain their nonprofit status, budget accurately, and provide reporting to government entities and their parishoners or members.
The IRS may begin a church tax inquiry only if an appropriate high-level Treasury official reasonably believes, based on a written statement of the facts and circumstances, that the organization: (a) may not qualify for the exemption; or (b) may not be paying tax on unrelated business or other taxable activity.