FAQS & RESOURCES

We require all Tampa staff/departments, and all of the microchurches and movements that we provide financial services for, to submit a budget, including their projected income and projected expenses, broken down by categories. All of our expense categories are categorized within Program, Administrative/Management, or Fundraising. The budget provides a context for how microchurches will account for their expenses.

Once donations and expenses have all been accounted for, we can reconcile an account, to make sure all the debits and credits we are showing in our accounting system match the month’s debits and credits from the bank. We can also run reports at this point to show a detailed picture of an account’s profit and loss for a period of time (for example).

Quickbooks Online. We prefer something like this accounting system because it allows us to be flexible and creative for the network and microchurhces. And it also produces reports that allow us to be responsible to our board and donors.

We don’t think there is a consistent answer. Certain things to consider:

• Is there someone in the community that has expertise in this area?

• Are you at the point where you want to pay yourself or other staff?

• Is there a need from your microchurches (for fundraising, expense processing, payroll)?

• As a Network Director, have these tasks exceeded your capacity?

You will want to consider what resources you actually have the capacity to offer your microchurches. When the Underground first started, our Finance Department was primarily accepting donations. As we grew, we added other services, such as providing payroll services and purchasing cards. In order to create a sustainable system, you should have a clearly defined on-ramp and off-ramp for the microchurches you serve: what are baseline services you will provide for them when they first start with you, and at what point will you help them transition into incorporating as their own 501c3?