About the Offering Module

ParishSOFT Offering is a software solution in the ParishSOFT Family Suite of applications that helps churches record and manage charitable contributions given to their organization by members and benefactors. The module helps you manage regular offerings, contributions, and pledges made to specific funds and to capital campaigns.

Licensing

Your organization must be licensed for ParishSOFT Offering to use this module.

Key Features

ParishSOFT Offerings key features include the following:

Ability to record donor contributions made through regular offerings and gifts to specific funds.
Ability to generate reports on all types of charitable contributions.
Ability to restrict financial information to individuals on a need-to-know basis by enabling organizations to set access permissions on funds.
Internal control systems to help deter fraud.

Family and Member Information

Family and member and information is the foundation of your ParishSOFT database. Families and members must exist in your database before you can record their contributions and pledges in the Offering module. If you haven't set up your organization's family and member records, you'll need to do so before using this module. The family and member data that you set up in ParishSOFT's Family Directory module carry over into Offering and other modules in ParishSOFT Family Suite.

Because family and member information impact all other modules in ParishSOFT Family Suite, it is essential that your family and member data is accurate and kept up to date. Ask your staff to contact members if registration information is not complete. Complete records can save you time in the long run.

Establish a style for your family and member records. Be sure to document this style with your staff so that they adhere to it when adding information to records. A consistent style helps make your data and the reports generated from your data look more professional. For example, decide whether to use the ampersand (&) or the word "and" in mailing names and whether to use courtesy titles, such as "Mr." and "Mrs." before member's names.

Home Page Overview

The Home page is the page you see when you open the Offering module either by selecting Offering on the Navigation bar menu or by selecting the Go to Offering link on the ParishSOFT Family Suite Home page. The Home page provides quick access to your organization's pledge, contribution, and other data with a single click of a mouse.

By default, the Navigation Bar is expanded, so the entire name of each page is visible. If you need more viewing space in the right panel, you can collapse the menu by clicking .

Doing so minimizes the menu so that only the page icons are visible:

To return the Navigation Bar back to the expanded position, click (Expand). Note that the state (expanded or minimized) of the menu that you specify on any page stays the same on all pages until you change it.
The Navigation Bar is the menu that sits on left side of the Home page (and on every other page in the module). The menu lists the module's primary pages and provides a way for you to quickly move from one page to another. When you want to view a specific page's content, simply select the page option.
The Organization list is located above the Navigation Bar. By default, this dropdown list is closed and shows the name of the organization you are working in.
- If you have access to one organization, the list displays the name of your organization. The dropdown functionality is disabled because you have limited access.
- If you have access to multiple organizations, the list displays the name of the organization you are working on or last worked in. Select the organization’s name to display a list of all the organizations you have permission to access. If the list is long, you can either type the organization’s name into the Search Organizations field (see illustration below) or use your mouse to scroll through the list to find the organization you want and then select it.
On the Offering Landing Page, each functional area in the module is represented by a separate container, called a "card." A card serves as an entry point to data within the named area. As illustrated below, each card contains the name of the functional area, an icon, and a link to specific content within it:
- Header: the area at the top of each card that shows the name of the functional area in the card represents, for example, Contributions and Settings.
- Icon: the center of each card contains an icon that represents the data and functions accessible in the functional area. For example, the coin icon appears on the Contributions card.
- Footer: the area at the bottom of each card contains one or more links to pages to a page within the functional area. For example, on the Contributions card, the Today link takes you to the contributions submitted that day while clicking the Year link takes you to the contributions submitted in the last 365 days.
The cards are not clickable elements. To access a content area, you must click the links at the bottom of the card. For example, on the Contributions card clicking the Week link (see previous image) takes to the Contributions page.
Click to access the ParishSOFT Knowledge Base. The Help opens in a separate browser so that you can view it while working in the module. The Help provides an overview of Offering concepts and features and offers step-by-step instructions on how to perform specific Offering tasks.
This button shows the initials of the logged-in user. Clicking the button display the Log Out option. Click this option to log out of Family Suite.
The links at the bottom of each card let you access a functional area's specific content. For example, on the Pledges card (see below), clicking the Go to Pledges link takes you directly to the Pledges page where you can work with your organization's pledge records.

Some cards have multiple links. These links let you access specific content within a functional area. For example, clicking Today (see below) on the Contributions card takes you to a page showing only those contributions posted on today's date. On the Batches card, clicking Closed takes you to a page that contains a list of closed batches only.
To access the Resource Hub click . The Resource Hub houses a number of important links, such as how to contact our Support team, what's new with ParishSOFT Family Suite, and upcoming training events (see image below).