Deceased Memorial Data Entry

Jonah KucinskiStewart

I'm somewhat new to database management and recently my organization was told we are going past our constituent limit (and our database is pretty old!) I had an idea but wasn't sure if it was viable: when people donate in memory of a person we don't have in our database, would it be a good idea to associate the tribute with a generalized record (ie: Anonymous) and notate in the tribute who it was for, cutting down on excess constituent records without sacrificing the data integrity of the gifts attached to the tribute?

Kylee Hamilton

Following as I would love a work around for this as well!

If donations aren't directed to us and we've only received one donation, we currently don't add the record and/or tribute, we add an IMO code as a gift note and pull NOK notifications (if the NOK is available) through the gifts notes.

Karen Diener

I have definitely recommended that for situations like a gift “in memory of Aunt Betty” or “in honor of your parents”. You typically have no idea who “Aunt Betty” or “your parents” are, so no point in setting up a full record for (presumably) that one-time donation.

To clear, this is only for those “one-off” types of gifts. If you had a relationship to the person being honored or remembered, or people in your database do, then they should have their own record. The anonymous record is more often an exception than a rule.

Karen

Jonah KucinskiStewart

Awesome! and thank you for the clarification, we usually get a broad mix of donations for existing constituents and one off's, so getting a generalized record for one off tribute donations will really help cut down on excess records (so many empty records ?). Thanks for the feedback!

Jeannie Goings

In our database we have a record for the database. Our database has a name. ?

To this record we attach job aides - this reduces the number of excuses, I can't do my job because, I don't know where to find help.

To this record we attach memorial/tribute gifts where the honoree does not have a constituent record in our db.

Linda Burns

Yes, we have an individual record with only the last name filled in with Memorial Tributes - Miscellaneous.