Donations & Funds

Recording Donations

Record donations as they come in from Sunday service, mail, or other sources.

Adding a Donation

1. Navigate to Finance → Donations in the sidebar
2. Click the Record Donation button
3. Select the donor or mark as anonymous
4. Fill in the donation details
5. Click Save

Donation Fields

Anonymous Donations

When you don't select a donor for a donation, it's recorded as anonymous. Anonymous donations are:

• Included in all financial reports and fund totals
• Excluded from individual giving statements
• Displayed as "Anonymous" in donation lists

Linking Unmatched Donations

When donations are imported from external sources like Planning Center, they may include a donor name but not be linked to a member record in Ecclesly. These "unlinked" donations are marked with an amber badge in the donations list.

Why Donations Become Unlinked

• Planning Center sync matches donors by email address only
• If a donor's email in Planning Center doesn't match their Ecclesly member record, the donation stores their name but remains unlinked
• New donors who gave before being added as members
• Donors who gave with a different email address

Linking a Single Donation

To link an individual donation to a member:

1. Find the donation in the list (look for the amber "Unlinked" badge)
2. Click the three-dot menu on the right
3. Select Edit
4. In the Donor field, search for and select the correct member
5. Click Save

Bulk Linking Multiple Donations

When you have many unlinked donations, use the dedicated bulk linking page to efficiently match them to members:

1. Navigate to Finance → Donations
2. Click the Link Unmatched button in the top toolbar
3. You'll see a dedicated page with statistics showing total unlinked donations, amounts, and auto-match counts
4. Use filters to narrow by campus, fund, or search by donor name
5. For each donation, use the member dropdown to select the correct member
6. Donations with exact name matches are automatically pre-selected
7. Click Link Donations to apply all changes at once

Benefits of Linking Donations

• Accurate giving statements — Linked donations appear on member statements
• Complete donor history — View all contributions on the member's profile
• Better reporting — Analyze giving patterns by household or family
• Tax documentation — Ensure donors receive proper acknowledgment

Reversing Donations

If a donation needs to be reversed (e.g., a check bounced or an error was made), you have two options depending on the situation:

Stripe Refunds (Automatic Voiding)

When you process a refund through Stripe, Ecclesly automatically marks the donation as voided. The donation remains in the system for audit purposes but is excluded from all giving totals and reports.

Deleting a Donation

For non-Stripe donations (cash, check, bank transfer) that need to be removed:

1. Find the donation in the donations list
2. Click the three-dot menu on the right side
3. Select Delete
4. Confirm the deletion

Managing Funds

Funds (also called categories) help you organize donations by purpose and track giving toward specific goals.

Creating a Fund

1. Navigate to Finance → Funds
2. Click Add Fund
3. Fill in the fund details
4. Click Save

Fund Fields

Giving Statements

Generate giving statements for donors to use for tax purposes.

Generating Statements

1. Navigate to Finance → Giving Statements
2. Select the year
3. Choose which donors to include
4. Click Generate
5. Download as PDF

Statement Contents

Each giving statement includes:

• Your church's name and address
• Donor's name and address
• List of donations with dates, amounts, and funds
• Total contributions for the year
• Tax-deductible amount (only includes donations to tax-deductible funds)

Giving Reports

Analyze giving patterns with built-in reports.

Available Reports