Donor Category Report

Jen Branstrom

I am using a donor category report for the lifetime giving section for our Annual Report. What is your definition of lifetime giving? Do you list donor who haven't given in that fiscal year? This report is including donors who haven't given in a long time.

Thanks in advance for your response.

Jen

Jess Moxsky

I don't know that I can speak for my current organization, but historically I have worked under the assumption that “lifetime giving” does what it says on the box: It's a total of all contributions recorded for that donor. I believe in many reports you can specify which gift types to include (if you wanted only cash gifts, etc).

As far as lapsed or LYBUNT/SYBUNT donors, it would heavily depend on your organization and what the purpose of that lifetime giving section of your annual report is. Are you only trying to report on active constituents? You can always double check that inactive/deceased box on reports, queries, and exports to determine whether you are pulling only active living donors or all historic donors.

Christine Cooke

Lifetime Giving can be defined different ways by different orgs.

The fact that you are mentioning that someone who has not given recently is on the list and you are concerned makes me wonder if you, or your org, only want the list to show “active” (last year, last three years, last five years?). In my perspective that is not Lifetime,

For me, and anywhere I have worked Lifetime Giving has been defined as the cumulative giving history of donors throughout the lifetime of the organization - as best as you can reflect that given that databases were not a thing before 30 or so years ago. So even if they have not given in 10 years, they did give during the lifetime of the org. It's a can of worms - example, if someone gave for 40 years but now they've been dead for 8 years do you no longer list them? even though they have family members that still do give and expect to see all the members listed on the AR?

Some of the orgs do refine with only certain gift types and/or funds (some funds may have pass through or other historical disclaimers and are excluded).

If this is the first time you have pulled this for an Annual Report for this org, I suggest a conversation/investigation as to how it has been pulled in the past because you need to stay consistent with those published reports or there can be questions/complaints from your community as to why someone is included/excluded.

Just my two cents.

Jen Branstrom

I have pulled this lifetime report for our Annual Report prior. We got away from it for a few years. I have always pulled in anyone who has given since we started this database. I was just wondering how others were pulling it.


Thanks for your input.


Jen B.