Linking Planned Gifts to a DAF Gift

Philip Mitchell
Philip Mitchell
Sixth Anniversary
in Blackbaud Raiser's Edge NXT®: General Discussions

Hi everyone,

 

We’re running into a situation in Raiser’s Edge and I’m curious how other shops handle it.

We received a $50,000 gift from Bank of America Charitable Gift Fund (DAF), so the hard credit is on the DAF, not the individual donor. However, the gift fulfills two $25,000 planned gifts associated with the individual donor.

 

Because the DAF holds the hard credit, I can’t find a clean way to link the realized amount to each planned gift record.

 

In the past we’ve sometimes $0 out planned gifts once the funds are received, but these records attributes, so I want to make sure we’re handling it correctly.

 

How are others managing this?

  • Do you link the planned gift to the DAF gift somehow?
  • Mark the planned gift as realized and adjust the amount?
  • Handle it another way?

Would love to hear how other institutions track this.

Thanks!

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Answers

  • Crystal Bruce
    Crystal Bruce admin
    Tenth Anniversary Kudos 5 Commented in Discussion First Reply

    Hi @Philip Mitchell - I'm tagging in a few All-Stars who might be able to help! @JoAnn Strommen @Dan Snyder @Austen Brown @Carlene Johnson.

  • Dan Snyder
    Dan Snyder Community All-Star
    Tenth Anniversary Kudos 5 April 2026 Monthly Challenge March 2026 Challenge: Answered Questions

    @Philip Mitchell We do not use the specific planned gift module for our planned gifts (mostly because we had a system in place before we had access) so what we do at my org may not be helpful.

    For DAF payments that pay off a pledge (bequest or other multi-year commitment) we do also hard credit the DAF and we include a gift code of Pledge Payment so our reporting places it in the correct area. On the pledge record, that is on the individual's record, we write off the corresponding amount received from the DAF. This sounds similar to the manually marking a PG as realized and adjusting the amount, but again I do not have that direct experience.

    I am not saying this is best practice, more just an option. Hopefully you get some other thoughts from the other All-Stars Crystal tagged or other community members.

  • Peggy Dolter
    Peggy Dolter
    Second Anniversary Name Dropper Participant Facilitator 1

    We have the same question that @Philip Mitchell raised. We have had RE for less than a year and we are trying to figure out what our practices are. My question to @Dan Snyder is, if you write off the pledge, doesn't that reduce the individual's lifetime giving total? I realize that this money is arriving after the person's lifetime, but still, the lifetime giving total often matters to their survivors. Since you don't use the specific planned gift module, if you simply call the pledge a pledge, you could give soft credit to the deceased donor so that they could be recognized posthumously. Why is that not your practice? Thanks for sharing your ideas and experience.

    cc: @Nelle Stough

  • Dan Snyder
    Dan Snyder Community All-Star
    Tenth Anniversary Kudos 5 April 2026 Monthly Challenge March 2026 Challenge: Answered Questions

    @Peggy Dolter A write off would not reduce the lifetime giving, just reduce the pledge balance. Even if we did an adjustment to reduce the pledge amount, we are giving the donor (alive or dead) soft credit for the payment from their donor advised fund so it is still included in their lifetime giving.

    I realize I left the specific part of soft crediting the donor in our DAF process above and again, I follow this approach because it fits within a longstanding way of tracking planned gifts and it did not make sense to go back and convert everything to the planned giving module.

  • Alex Wong
    Alex Wong Community All-Star
    Tenth Anniversary Kudos 5 Facilitator 4 bbcon 2025 Attendee Badge

    @Dan Snyder written of pledges works differently in "summary of gift" for lifetime giving depending on how you run it.

    • Gift Querying and summing it in excel or other visualization tool
      • this depends on how do you the summing, so won't comment
    • Constituent Query (export from Query)
      • write off amount included in sum of giving amount
    • Consituent Export (export from Export module)
      • write off amount is NOT included in sum of giving amount

    @Peggy Dolter I'm not particularly familiar with how our finance team does planned giving, but from "data reporting" pov, I think they do not record a "Planned Gift" gift record. They only record when it is received. Opportunity record is used to track what "may" come in.

  • Dan Snyder
    Dan Snyder Community All-Star
    Tenth Anniversary Kudos 5 April 2026 Monthly Challenge March 2026 Challenge: Answered Questions

    Thanks @Alex Wong for that distinction in exported data.

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