Membership Work Around

Potique Johnson

Does anyone currently track memberships without using the membership module and if so can you tell me the process or procedure you are using?

JoAnn Strommen

@Potique Johnson Our athletic ‘booster’ club has annual memberships. I found these were previously entered as gifts which they definitely are not as person received all kinds of perks and preferential seating.

So that they do have a record in RE, my solution was to create an event. It's in our system, can pull list if needed, receipt amount is $0 so doesn't pull in lifetime (which we did not want).

That is our workaround. Does work as memberships are annual. Would not work well for monthly/expiring memberships.

Christine Robertson

@Potique Johnson As @JoAnn Strommen mentioned, I've seen Events and since they can be linked to gifts, I think that's likely the best workaround. That said, if you are doing true memberships and need reporting for upgrades, renewals, downgrades, lapses, etc., then I would absolutely recommend considering the Membership module. Nothing else will give you all the same functionality.

Dariel Dixon

@Potique Johnson, I asked a similar question a couple of years ago. It obviously depends on the types of memberships and how those memberships are defined. For my example, we were looking for giving level memberships. @JoAnn Strommen's workaround wouldn't work as it would just get lost in the large number of events we already have.

For the record, I'm still looking for a better way or any alternative.

Alex Wong

@Potique Johnson it does depend on what you mean by “membership”. For example, we had a “simple” situation where young leaders are given an opportunity to “purchase” a membership early in the year, and if they did, they will receive discount for all YL event of the year (10% i think). The way we have done it (prior to having Membership module, and even after, didn't really changed it) is via Appeal. We have a specific appeal for this membership, and a purchase (which is going to result in a gift record in RE) will be recorded with the Appeal. Our YL fundraiser can easily run a gift report on the Appeal to know who the members are for sending discount, communication, and to solicit them again next year.

@Dariel Dixon
For a dynamic/giving-based membership, like a donor category/giving society, RE doesn't really offer much there, as it is resource intensive to “link” every gifts to membership. This is where SKY API/SKY Addins custom will shrine so much brighter, which you already read about in this post:

putting here for Potique to ponder on.

Potique Johnson

@Dariel Dixon
So, Since I'm not yet familiar with SKY API and Power Platform.

We came up with a new procedure utilizing constituent codes. It gives us what we need:

Procedure for set up Tracking of Auxiliary Membership Dues

1. Determine who is already in RE database by matching up the Auxiliary member list with our donors coded with constituent code: Auxiliary Current, Auxiliary Current Spouse, Lifetime member.
2. Whoever is not in RE, needs to be entered as a new constituent with appropriate constituent code. (Auxiliary current or Lifetime)
3. After you have the start date of each member, need to enter “all” start dates and renewal dates in RE under BIO 2 tab next to their constituent code.
4. When you get a new membership, need to enter this as a new constituent (unless already in RE) into RE and assign the Auxiliary constituent code and enter the from date and renewal date.
5. Each month, run query in your Jennifer Easley query folder: “Auxiliary Membership Renewals-due monthly” so you can invoice them for the next year.

This will work for now.