It’s that time again – time to start thinking about year-end procedures. If you’re a ResultsPlus user, that means closing out your calendar year, and that can be a little scary if it’s your first (or even your tenth) time doing it. This enables your system to generate final numbers and stats for the year, and to clear the counters in preparation for the new year.
But before you bite the bullet and close your 2015 year, there are some tasks you need to complete:
- Complete and close out all of your gift batches.
- Run year-end reports.
- Back up your database.
- Perform the actual year-end close. Remember that this will reset several fields in your database, so run all of your reports BEFORE closing the year.
A little pointer: If you think you’ll receive additional gifts for 2015, we recommend that you hold off closing your year for a few weeks. That way, you can continue to enter gifts for the year you are closing, while entering gifts for the new year in separate, unposted batches.
Before you close your fiscal year, here are some things to remember:
- Post all of your gift batches so they are counted in 2015. Hold any gifts you want to post in 2016 until you are done with year-end processing.
- Run any year-end reports you wish to have for your records. There are no required reports that must be run at year-end, but some reports are less meaningful after the year is closed. We recommend running:
- LYBUNT
- SYBUNT
- Matching Gifts
- Outstanding Pledge Report by Fund
- Pledges Past Due
- Solicitor Analysis
- If Giving Levels are set up for year-to-date updating, you may want to run related reports or do your mailings before the Giving Level field is cleared after closing your year.
So, when you’ve finally decided that it’s time to close out 2015, here’s how to do it:
- Open the Maintenance
- Click the Close fiscal year button on the ribbon
- On the Close Fiscal Year screen, select the options that best describe what you have done.
- Click Close Fiscal Year
To reset your calendar so you’re ready for 2016 to start:
- Enter any gifts that you want to record as having been processed in 2015.
- Rn tax letters for those donors who want them
- Make a back-up copy of your database
- Reset your calendar year:
- Open the Maintenance
- Click the Reset calendar year button
- On the Reset Calendar Year screen, select the option that best describes the activities you have completed
- Click Reset Calendar Year
If you have any questions about year-end procedures, please don’t hesitate to contact us at success@resultsplussoftware.com.