Saving Documents in Raisers Edge

Julie Kanara · April 2022

Hello,

My organization is new to Raiser's Edge. We are wondering what best practices are regarding the saving of documents (i.e., tax receipt, donations (checks, online giving forms, etc.), pledges, gift agreements) to the Media tab in the database view / Attachments in Web View?

We are concerned that there is a cap to how many documents we can store; however, our onboarding consultant told us there was no limit.

We have uploaded all Pledges and Gift Agreements so far to their relevant constituent profile. However, we are not sure if we should upload all the receipts and donation documentation for all constituents. Some donors will only have a few attachments, while others will have hundreds of documents.

Should we only save documentation for major donors? One of our major donors recently asked for copies of all her receipts over her lifetime and unfortunately we could not locate all of them. That's why I'm wondering if we upload all receipts regardless of how cumbersome it may be.

Thanks for your advice!

Ray Bergman · April 2022

Moving this topic to the Raiser's Edge community for better visability.

JoAnn Strommen · April 2022

Welcome to the BB Community, @Julie Kanara.

I'm guessing there may be orgs that do as you are suggestion. My first question is why do you need that on their record? Most orgs keep electronic or hard copies of payment documents as part of finance dept files. Entering them thru the media tab in database view would take considerable time and I would have concerns as well about security. With the BB breach, for many orgs the files on the media tabs were possibly compromised. If you were to upload, I think you would want to redact all the account info on the check copies.

And quirky RE NXT, those uploaded in webview which is much easier are not visible in database view. They are also lost if you ever have to restore your db from a backup.

We do upload LOIs and MOUs. Pledge agreements are only done if there is a special reason that details are needed for reference.

I can not imagine why anyone would need a “copy of their receipts” for their life time. Giving history, maybe. But receipts? There is a report in RE that you can run that will list receipt # but not receipt text. There is no IRS requirement to keep receipts for a lifetime.

At previous org we kept electronic files of receipts (done by batch) for set time but did not save on individual records. Here they are saved by date. If there's ever a question about a gift from several years earlier, you always have the gift record on RE to verify a donation.

I'd give your decision a lot of thought on the necessity, security and time involved before making a decision.

Julie Kanara · April 2022

Hi JoAnn,

Thank you so much for sharing and your advice. I agree with your recommendations completely and appreciate you taking the time to write.

Carrie Powell · April 2022

We generally do the same as JoAnn for webview: LOIs (but only if they do not contain credit card info) and MOUs (which are rare for us). We also attach obituaries, particularly if the donor/family encourages gifts to our organization in lieu of flowers. (It's also a confirmation that the person has actually died, which triggers our data entry staff to make adjustments to their record.)

Other documentation is still sometimes added to the database view, such as letters about planned gifts. As has been mentioned, what's added in webview is not accessible in database view.

Julie Kanara · April 2022

Thank you Carrie! Adding obituaries is a great idea that we will incorporate. Appreciate you taking the time to reply

Carlene Johnson · April 2022

Julie Kanara:
Thank you Carrie! Adding obituaries is a great idea that we will incorporate. Appreciate you taking the time to reply

We actually opted to not add obituaries as an attachment, but rather we copy/past the test of the obit into a notepad. Notepad type = Deceased Notification and Title = Obituary.

This allows the obit to be at the top level so it is easily accessible. Additionally, by having it as text we can search on it and export the text if needed.

There are a standard number of things we do when marking someone as deceased and I've set up a “default” in database view allowing us to use the “load defaults” feature to quickly update all the info we need, create the notepad type, and someone just needs to ctrl+v the obit into the notepad.

We frequently need to back to obits for various bits of research, so having it searchable and accessible is key.

Saving Documents in Raisers Edge

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