As churches try to become better stewards of the finances entrusted to them they are turning to technology to help them out. There are many church management software packages out there that will help churches manage their membership, events, and finances.

Managing church finances is important for a couple of reasons: (1) members work hard to earn money and they give it to the church in good-faith, and (2) money donated to the church can be deducted for tax purposes. If the money is not managed wisely and donors do not receive a donor statement saying how much they contributed at the end of the year, it becomes more difficult for donors to claim the deduction.

Good church donation software packages will help your church manage the different types of donations easily. For example, if a donor sends in a general contribution that can be used for anything, then the donation software categorizes this as unrestricted. However if a donor sends in a contribution-specific donation then the software will categorize the contribution as temporarily restricted. Once the contribution requirements have been met you can move the assets from temporarily restricted to unrestricted at the click of a button.

Another great use of church donation software is the automation of the donor statements at the end of the year. Churches generally send out an official statement at the end of the year to all of those who contributed during the year. The members then use this official statement to receive a deduction for tax purposes. Money donated to churches is tax-exempt. The creation of the letter for hundreds of different donors can be burdensome. However, donation software can quickly perform this process for you. Simply pull up the list of donors and select print donor statements.

Donation software for churches can be used to generate other handy reports. For example you can use it to show leadership how the church is progressing towards its goals and how the church administrators are doing with their budget. Any time during the year you can quickly pull up a report on how much money any given donor has contributed.

Church financial administrators need to guard donations closely. This money has been worked for and given without regret. In addition this money can be deducted for tax purposes spurring some contributors to give even more. Church donation software makes managing this process much easier.

Welcome to the Church Accounting Software Guide. In order to better serve you, I’ve decided to start letting you email me directly with your questions about what type of software will work best for your church or non-profit organization. For those of you who are new to this whole idea of church or non-profit accounting and are feeling a bit overwhelmed, feel free to email me as well. I can provide you with some resources to get you started.

It’s pretty simple. You email me information about your church (see below for more details on what information you should include) and I email you back with the software package(s) that will be the best fit for your church or non-profit.

For first time visitors to this site, I suppose I should explain who I am so you realize you are getting informed advice. My name is Nate Waddoups and I have a Bachelors and a Masters degree in Accountancy from a religious school (which also happens to be ranked in the top 5 best accounting schools). In addition to my training in school I’ve spent three years working directly in the church finance trenches—of course my church would ask me to manage the finances because of the accounting degree.  I’ve done hours and hours of research and experimenting with the different church accounting or management packages available. The truth is most of the software packages available are pretty good, but they all have different features and depending on what your needs are you may or may not need all of these features.

For those of you who want some help, send me an email at churchaccountant@gmail.com and give me some basic information about your church. I’ll get back to you with my recommendations within 24 hours (unless it’s a weekend).

Below are some items you might want to share in your email.

Number of Members in Your Church:

Number of People Managing your Church’s Finances:

Experience of People Managing your Church’s Finances: Do they understand basic accounting principles? Do they know anything about accounting for non-profits?

Does your church already have an accounting system in place? If so, which one?

Are you looking for software to manage membership? Or do you just want a church financial software package to manage contributions?

Feel free to send me any other information you think will be helpful.

Always remember that church donations are sacred and should be managed carefully. In addition you’ll need to be in conformance with IRS section 501(c)(3) to be tax-exempt. The right church accounting programs will help you be in compliance. Note that software does not take the place of a licensed tax CPA or lawyer.

Before you make your purchase, make sure to double, nay triple check to verify that your computer(s) meet at least the minimum requirements for the software. There is nothing worse than spending money on software, returning back to your computer, placing the CD in the computer, and then finding out that your computer can’t handle the software. Please make sure you meet the minimum requirements for any software you buy for your church.

Unfortunately many companies that offer church software fail to place the minimum requirements on their websites. If you find yourself in this situation, then you have three options: (1) Gamble and purchase the software anyway hoping that your computers will have what it takes–not recommended (2) Contact the company via phone or email (3) Go to a different website. Gambling is never recommended

After searching the Internet, we’ve found that most church accounting software requires at least 64-256mb of ram. This may not seem like a lot to some people, but many churches don’t have a big budget to buy top end computers.

We hope we have saved you some time in your quest to purchase church software. Feel free to leave any comments about information you may have acquired.

As with most products, if you spend a little more it is because the product is a little better. The trick is finding out what your church’s needs are. You might ask yourself, “What is it that I need to track?” You may be wanting to track your membership from week to week, or how much offerings are given on a monthly or yearly basis. More complex questions might be, how much taxes have I withheld for the paid clergy or how much will I need to withhold? The bottom line is to find out what exactly you need the software for before buying it.

Many church accounting services provided by companies will want to charge you on a monthly basis. This is becoming more common in almost all businesses. Prices start around $30 a month and go as high as $200 a month. We wouldn’t recommend paying more than that for your church accounting software. If you dislike monthly fees, then you can buy quickbooks online for about $200 over at Microsoft.

The best of luck in your hunt for your church management software. If you have any additional pricing information, feel free to post it in the comments box below.

As is always our policy, we do not endorse one church software system over another. We simply want to provide you information.

• Sunday Software

First of all, if you started the journey for your church’s accounting system by typing into google “free church accounting software” then you likely ended up on a sub-domain of sundaysoftware.com. SundaySoftware does not make accounting software; however, they do provide links to other sites that do.

• Churchtrac.com

The good new about churchtrac is that they actually do offer free church accounting software. The bad news is that the software is only for small churches. After some investigation we learned that small churches means less than 100 people.

**** Update July 15, 2010***

• Gnucash.com

Gnucash offers some software that could be used as free church management software. This software was originally built for businesses which may mean that you need to tweak it a bit for it to work for your church. It is open source and is considered by many as the best free accounting package available.

****Update April 26 2010 ****

Vickey over at freechurchaccounting.com has some free spreadsheets that can be an excellent solution for those of you looking for a completely free way to perform your churches’ accounting.

Synopsis
If the church that your managing has less than 100 people or if you don’t mind having some advertisements floating around the screen then you just may be able to find some free church accounting software. Otherwise, it appears you will have to fork out the cash to get the software.

**** Update June 19, 2009 ****

After thinking more about this topic, I have a few other recommendations if you are looking to save some money. If your church’s accounting systems is relatively simple then you could probably get away with using Microsoft Excel. Although most thoroughbred accountants will scoff at you for not using some sort of specialized software. And if you want to go completely free, then why not try Open Office. I know a lot of Non-Profits actually use this software and it does a decent job. Although it might take you a while to get over some of the annoying little quirks.