I work at an independent school that runs an annual auction. We have been using AuctionMaestro Pro for two years, and have found that we use very little of its overall functionality.

We are exploring whether or not we can run the auction without AMP, using just Raiser's Edge (we have the events module). Does anyone have any experience with this? Any insights?

Thank you.

I currently do this using Raiser's Edge with the Events Module. If you search the archives I think there has been a lot of discussion about this. I can give you a quick overview and then you can ask me some particular questions if you'd like. There may also be others that do it differently.

I have a whole system set up around our auction using the event module and Raisers edge. 1) Gift In Kind auction items are entered using a specific campaign that I pull out of all of our revenue reports (Just Like I pull out Face Value Planned Gifts and Government grants taht I can't count in my financials but my boss wants in Board reports, etc.) 2) These items contain the value of the item as provided by the donor - which we print in our auction booklet and on the bid sheets (to enable us to follow IRS regulations in calculating the actual donative value for the purchaser later) The donor of these items gets a thank you letter that has no mention of the dollar value. The letter pulls in the NOTES field from the Gift notes which contains the long decription of what the donated item is. 3)We use the notes fields & attributes fields in the gift to track all sorts of other information to be used in our auction item tracking. (Minimum Start Bid, Location of the item, Do we need to assign someone to go pick up the item?, Silent Bid, etc.) 4) I create an event for each auction we hold - and the GIK's are all linked to this event with a participent type of Item Donor 5) After the auction is over, The winning bid is calculated against the value of the GIK to determine the IRS donative value. This value willbe added in the winners gift receipt field. 6) Auction purchase are cash gifts which I link to the auction event with a participant type of Item Winner. I can calculate the value of what was donated versus what was purchased from the Event/View Summaries and break down the financial goal summary by type of participant.

The gift in kind (item donation for an auction, etc.)is entered as a gift with a Campaign Code that is never used in financial reporting or on annual statements.

The Gift Amount is the dollar amount the donor tells you the item is worth so it can be used in recognition level calculations and as the value of the item on bid sheets and in calculations for the item winners donation amount.

The Receipt Amount is zero.

I then put a Gift Note on the gift giving the description of the item. I use the gift notes fields in differing ways so the information can be pulled easily into reports and bid sheets, etc.

Example: I use the Title field for the Category & Number (A-05 equals Art Auction Item Number 5 - the preceding zero allows me to group and sort all of the Category & Number assignments because the field is alpha numeric - otherwise it would list A1, A11, A12, etc before it gets to A2)

The description field is used for a short description that will easily fit on reports (example: Abstract Oil Painting)

The Notes field is used for a long description of the item - including information that you may need to print on a gift certificate, etc if the donor doesn't have GC's and asks us to create one.

The Type field is used for which auction (example: Gala, Pre-Gala,etc.)

I then link the gift to the event in the event module as a donation with a participation code of item donor (Item winners will be linked later after the auction occurs and they make their payment - at which point their gifts are entered as normal revenue gifts but the benefits fields are used in the gift to calculate receipt value and print the description of the item and benefits on the receipt)

The Acknowledgement to the Gift In Kind Auction Item Donor just lists the short description of the item - no dollar value is mentioned

Laurel,

 What is your reasoning for entering in gifts for both the In-Kind donation as well as the auction item purchase? Wouldn't it be possible to just add all the neccesary information like the Fair Market Value of the donated item and a description in the Gift Notes section of the auction purchase gift? Does your business office require you to enter in the In-Kind gifts? We have never entered in the auction donations in the past and are now being asked to do so but no one has a clear answer as to why. Any additional information would be helpful!

Thanks,

Mary Kate

If someone donates a GIK to your organization, you must record it and provide them with a receipt. This GIK will become an asset (and you will need to change it to a revenue gift) should it not sell at the auction. You also must have a published Value of the donated Item for your auction items in order to figure out the donation portion of the auction purchase. By using the database, it allows you to record all of the details of the GIK Auction item to be pulled out for your auction booklet as well as providing any backup you need at audit to prove the donative portion of an auction purchase.

Laurel,

In doing research on how to enter auction wins/purchases, I ran across this June message from you on Forums.  Very helpful information and I have a question for you since you seem knowledgable on this subject. 

We hold a several silent auctions throughout the year.  We do not have the events module.  In the past, I have entered gift information on everyone that won (purchased) an auction item, calculating the benefit value vs the $ paid to get the tax deductible amount in the receipt field on the gift entry.  I am contemplating entering only those whose winning amount is over and above the value of the item - entering as the gift the the tax deductible donation part -  and sending a thank you that states that much as their gift receipt and giving them only credit in the thank you letter for that amount that was over and above the value of the item. What is your opinion on doing it this way versus entering all winning purchases even if there is a $0 tax deductible gift - which is what it sounds like you do.  Do you know what other organizations do in general?  Any other organizations out there that want to tell me what they do?

Thanks for your help with this.

Lane Crawford, Donor Relations Manager

Blue Ridge School

My question to you would be where is the revenue entered for these auction items if you're not planning to enter them? Are you counting the gifts in kind as revenue as opposed to the actual sale of the item?

I do both.  I enter - as a gift - the assigned value of the auction item into the gik donor's gift record because the donor needs to get credit for this donation. The fund this is assigned to is called a GIK fund and the description of the item goes into the reference field.

 Then, when it is bought/won by the purchaser of the item, I enter the bid amount in the purchasing donor's record (which is usually less than the value of the item) and caluculate the tax deduction.  If it is $0, that goes in the receipt field. The ty letter then states that goods and services were received by the donor so tax deductible amount is $0.  For those who pay over and above the value of the item, I once again record the bid amount as the gift and then the amount over and above in the receipt field.  The money and batch report then go to the finance office and they count it, of course, as revenue toward the fund raising entity here at the school that was doing the fund raising event i.e. alumni association or parent's association.  On my end, when I am entering the gifts, I credit the alum assoc. fund or parents assoc. fund with the total amount of the winning bid as well.  So, a long answer to your question, the revenue goes into the fund assigned to the entity raising the money from their event - both on my side in RE and the finance office side so we can then reconcile.

 As I am writing this, it occurs to me that I should probably continue this same process instead of cutting corners by just recording the donations that were over and above the amount of the item value.  Correct?

 Thanks again for your help with this,

Lane

So my next question is: How does your finance office (and you when running reports) know which GIK's are revenue and which are not? If you're housing them all in 1 fund I don't see how you're making the distinctin. You cannot count a GIK and its purchase both as revenue - you can only count the purchase - if the item is not purchased aor is a true GIK that yopur org is using than it needs to go in your revenue.

The finance office simply uses a GIK account that is meaningless and is basically a holding account for the gik values.  They do not count the auction item values as cash revenue.  I was unaware that we needed to provide them with the items that were not sold at the auction so they could then count these as revenue since it then becomes our property.  Our auditors have never questioned this.

At any rate, it looks like I have a better much better handle on all of this, thanks to your questions and comments.  Thanks for all your help.

 Lane 

Interesting thread...very helpful!

We enter ALL auction items and ALL corresponding auction purchases in the same fund (ex. 2010 Swan House Ball). 

The auction items have the "gift-in-kind" gift type.  The auction purchases have the "cash" gift type.  Both have the "Auction" appeal. I have never been asked to do anything differently or provide anything further for the auditors.  When reporting on revenue, I simply pull gift-in-kind into a separate column on the report.  

For the auction item, the gift amount and the gift receipt amount are the fair market value assigned by the donor.  For the auction purchase, the gift amount is the amount paid, and the gift receipt amount is $0 (if less than the value of the item) or the amount above the value of the item.

Does anyone have written policies and procedures surrounding their processing of in-kind gifts?  If so, could you share with the group? 

Also, we have a form that volunteers hand out to potential auction item donors.  The auction item donors fill this out and return it to us, mostly for our record-keeping.  We ask for a detailed description of the item as well as the fair market value that they have deteremined for the item.  I'm curious to see if other organizations have forms like this and could share them?

I think your auditors must be manually breaking down the GIK's and the 'Cash' Gifts since they are in a separate columns and matching them up as to what sold and what didn't. When you run overall revenue reports for your organization do you include any of these gifts? If you are including them (GIK's for the auction & Cash gifts for the auction) you are double counting revenue. Every revenue GIK our organization brings in needs to be offset with a corresponding expense as if we purchased it. If the GIK becomes an asset (not sold at an auction) it them has to be noted as such and set up for depreciation, etc. If we receive a GIK for an auction and it is sold in the same year we don't declare it as an asset - and the GIK is not a revenue generating gift in this case - the purchase is the revenue generating gift. If we keep the GIK, it is a revenue generating gift. Both GIK's and Cash auction items are in the same fund for us to - the Campaign field is what determines whether it is revenue generating or not.

We do have a form that auction item donors fill out - it is in duplicate so that they can keep a copy and we have a copy.

I do also have a quick example sheet on entering auction items - attached

Julie,

Thanks for your response on what your organization does for auctions.  It is very helpful to see that you do exactly the same thing that we do and that you have never had questions from your auditors either.   

We give forms to potential aution item donors as well - both here and at other organizations I have worked for.  It is the best way to get accurate information and provide a donor-designated fair-market value to the item that is then used for valuing the item and calculating the tax deductible portion of any "purchase" of the item. 

Thanks again for your response and helping me see that we are on the right track here.

 Lane Crawford