Our Alumni Association is incorporated in Virginia and we are currently in the early stages of applying for a 501c3 from the IRS, as we hope to eventually accept tax-exempt charitable contributions for student awards and scholarships, and possibly for other charitable deeds in our community.

I've been reading forums here by other administrators describing many difficulties and hurdles in dealing with PayPal on this topic.

My question is, can we meet all our needs for fundraising through Class Creator's payment system? I did see where I can manipulate the "reunion store" items for accepting donations--which is perfect! But are we required to provide any "proof of non-profit" status to Class Creator? What requirements, if any, does the IRS place on Class Creator for reporting/managing non-profits?

Is there anything else I should know, or ask about?

Thank you!

In a separate note, does Class Creator have any partnerships with any shipping services that can integrate with the reunion store?

Thanks again,

Terry

The donation features on our system are available without restriction. We do not in any way guarantee to your site visitors that your collection of donations is legitimate (or otherwise).

Any issues with the IRS are strictly between you and them. We are merely a service provider, and are in no way liable for the tax implications or any reporting of your use of the services we provide.

As I understand it (and this should be taken with a grain of salt as I am not a lawyer -- any serious questions on the matter should be taken up with a tax attorney), ad hoc organizations such as class reunion committees may collect and spend monies without incurring any tax burden so long as no one in the organization profits from the process and all labor is undertaken on a voluntary basis.

We do not have a relationship with any shippers, as we do not ship anything but electrons, and electrons require no packaging or postage.

I went the PalPal Route as a non profit. It took a couple of days to verify, and we were set up. The account is a business account as opposed to a personal account. Reports are downloadable daily, weekly or monthly. (The % saved in service fees was, to our class, worth the extra accounting, and manual entry).

Barbara "Ritter" Paris

Thank you for your quick reply, Eric. You confirmed what I suspected, but I just wanted to be sure. (I wonder why PayPal takes a position for requiring proof if they are not liable?)

Re: shipping, "...we do not ship anything but electrons..." LOL! I was referring to our class sites' shipping needs for store items sold online (tee shirts, mugs, etc). Probably we will choose to outsource merchandise handling (sales and shipping) through direct vendors, like Cafe Press. I'd prefer to handle all our financial transactions in one place, but we don't want the task of filling and shipping orders.

Maybe Class Creator will one day consider partnering with a third party vendor for handling shipping services.

Thanks again for your help.

Thank you, Barbara. What information did you have to provide to PayPal? And what advantage do you see in using PayPal over Class Creator's payment system?

I consistently read elsewhere in these forums that PayPal required proof of non-profit status, prompting at least one admin to note they had to seek a "Determination Letter, through filing an IRS Form 8718 AND a fee of $300." It seemed as if all admins agreed that their PayPal accounts (the non-profit business types) were frozen until this "proof" was provided--or until they changed the account type from non-profit to "service".

From Eric's post above, I understand Class Creator makes no distinction between account types.

Barbara Paris wrote:

Barb,
I use the reunion planner for a store.....you can have multiple reunion events going at the same time. We do not use paypal..why pay them a commission to paypal?????..when CC is free. You can accept checks, cash and credit cards...you can pass on the 4.9% CC credit card processing fee to the alumni. There is only some manual entries..and that's for checks and cash. It tracks all your purchase without having to require the alumni register to buy from your store.You can have the funds deposited in your Assoc. chking card electronically. Called an E-Check. All the info you need is in the reunion planner.
As far as setting up your non-profit status..consult a lawyer..there has to be someone who's an alumni that can help with that..we have many lawyers we consult for free.
See a tax attorney...per Eric's suggestion.
I did put on a donate button for paypal..but it's going to my personal account, which will be a pain..no one has donated that way yet..I now have our store up and running..so I will be taking that down.
If you have any questions...jut contact me..I will be glad to help.
Teresa "Terry" Alers wrote:

Hi Terry,
I read Eric's, Barb's and Darlene's posts. Coincidentally, I had a similar question and posed it to Kyle. My school is no longer in existence and our class reunion is too small for 501c status to be cost effective through my bank. So I went to PayPal, opened a business account (like you have done). I acquired a PP debit card and everything seemed fine. I would download payments through CC to my bank and upload money from my personal account to PP. This was fine for awhile. BTW, as I understand it, both CC and PP are services and may require, separately, their own individual rules and proof of status, or lack thereof.
Using PP gives one the freedom of movement in transferring and using funds. That's why I like them. I personally would vouch for both entities. My suggestion to you would be to call PP back, ask for customer service, then a supervisor in America with no accent. The supervisors' answers should be more consistent. I found they require no proof except a valid bank account into which and from which PP may send receive funds respectively.
You may find your non-profit status is not needed, unless you want it anyway.
Barbara

Thank you, everyone. Barbara, I don't quite follow the advantage in the downloading/uploading payments between CC and PP accounts, or the benefit of a PP debit card. We have a business bank account for receiving direct deposits and a debit card on that account for our expenses.

The IRS non-profit 501c3 status is desirable if it means we can solicit tax deductible contributions from our members, but we are currently weighing that option against the costs to set it up.

As far as I can tell, our best option may still be with Class Creator's payment system--for the simplicity, reporting, and in-house support provided. It looks like we may break even or possible save on fees as well.

OOPs..I called you Barb...sorry Terry....
Email me with any questions you have on our bank account ..we have a CPA who is giving us advice pro-bono..classmate..also consulted other lawyers within our alumni...You need to set up a non-profit with a professional CPA and a lawyer...it's called CYA...You then need to follow IRS rules..which is the easy part. I've been there done that..use to contact IRS about our churches finances and non-profit status, with other govt agencies.
Our Treasurer uses quicken for our accounting....and we have 3 people on the account..me, Chair of the committee and a co-treasurer for each of the yrs for our multi-yr site is the best way to handle the finances.

I hope this helps.
Teresa "Terry" Alers wrote:

It is so good to have you back, Darlene! This note is for you...

I accepted donations and registrations through PayPal until I found Class Creator. I changed the reunion registrations to Class Creator and left the donations going to PayPal. I've had the same account with PayPal well over ten years. What I did not like was having the funds in my personal account at PayPal. Now that Class Creator has Reunion Planner set for us to accept donations, I highly recommend that to everyone. If I ask for donations on my alumni site, I will be using Class Creator. However, I would definitely suggest you add an *(asterick) with the small print regarding the fee. Find the right words to add that they may consider an extra couple dollars to cover the fee. Or make it $6 increments vs. $5 to help pass the fee onto the classmate vs. the funds.

I've had several interruptions writing this, so I will say this.... I prefer the donation button on the home page but am not interested in using PayPal to receive the funds. I'd love to have an option for that button to direct funds to Class Creator. Until then, an announcement on the home page with a link and directions to the reunion planner. Set it up as a separate reunion to be sure other events are not showing.

I've been here...lurking in the shadows...reading all the posts...most of the time the ?s have been answered before I get a chance to read them.
Set up a Store in the reunion planner..give it a name
you can keep it active..along with other events.
Any Questions? Give me a shout out!
Thanx for the welcome back
Gwen Corey wrote:

Terry,
I totally agree with Gwen on her post. My advantage for downloading/uploading is because checks and registration fees made out to St. Angela Hall have to go somewhere and a bank account in a private name won't accept a check made out to the School. Gwen's right. Put the amounts made out to the school into the donation module and adjust where it goes from there. Actually I'm just leaving all the funds in CC for now and transferring to PP when I need to put money on the PP debit card which is the only charge card in the reunion's name.
I've had a few people send personal checks for registration to the School name. How do I get the amount on the charge card to use for various and sundry products for decorations, etc.? PP wouldn't accept it straight on. But I can put it in nCC as a donation to the school (which is defunct).
Sometimes I don't make myself very clear. I'm sorry. Kyle also suggested that these few bring their check book to the reunion itself and pay then. It's all up to your needs, size of school, size of reunion (i.e. how many out of state checks you may receive, etc.). Things like that.
Barbara

Barb,
I use the reunion planner for a store.....you can have multiple reunion events going at the same time. We do not use paypal..why pay them a commission to paypal?????..when CC is free. You can accept checks, cash and credit cards...you can pass on the 4.9% CC credit card processing fee to the alumni.

We're only paying 2.9% as a Non Profit with PayPal on credit card payments. The majority of payments are via check and go directly to the head of our Reunion Committee... no fees.

Another Barbara
Another Tiger

We are a Non Profit, and have been for years.

CC's rate will most likely go down, once they get enough of people using the credit card option. Paypal is cheap..cause it has so many users.
So Peeps..start encouraging your people to use the credit card option..so CC can negociate(?) a lesser rate.
I don't like doing more paperwork than I have to..and neither does my Treasurer....using both systems is not an option for us.

Barbara,
You're right. Quite a few of my group Have paid by check. I need to look into his a bit more deeply.
I always seem to get good ideas when I hash thins around with all of you. I'm glad yu asked this quesion in the first place, Terry. Thank you!
Barbara

Hi, Barbara... From your longer post above, I read you accept funds and hold them in CC (there is a fee) and then you transfer than (somehow) to a PayPal debit card. I'm thinking there is has to be a fee in there somewhere for PayPal.. in accepting the payment, maybe. I just seems to me that you may be in fee-overkill. You are going to have that without a bank account, unless someone knows of another way. Then again, maybe you found a way around PayPal.

Hi Gwen,
There's no fee for PayPal to accept funds and it goes onto the PayPal Debit card as needed. But, I do leave the funds in Class Creator as long as I don't need to transfer it. Instead of PayPal drawing from a bank I just make sure there's always enough cashin the PP acct so they don't have to draw from anywhere.
I talked to customer service for a long time and finally got through to them that CC is the only place I have an account under the school name. I still have to use a back up bank acct number in case they feel there may be a collection problem. But it sure is handy when alumni send checks and now I can put it in the 'donation' slot at CC.
I had a problem with one girl's check. She made it out incorrectly and was quite stubborn about it.That's how this got started. I talked to CC and PP 2 or 3 times each. Came up with this idea since my bank acct is not in the name of the Reunion.
Nice to hear from you again.
Barbara

We are up and running with donations, and CC's payment system is working out really well! Thank you, everyone, for your great advise.

Question for the CC Team: is there some way you can remove the text, "Please select the quantity desired from the dropdown to the right of each item." from the payment form when ordering reunion store DONATION products, please? It makes no sense at all to the process (non-unit items have no "quantity" option available).

Thank you!

Terry,

This has been suggested before. Not sure if it will happen with the current reunion planner or if it will have to wait for the "new and improved reunion planner" that Brad hinted about during the "New Features Reveal" webinar in January.

Thanks, Kyle. I recognize that removing that text may not be an "easy fix"; probably requiring a number of IF/THEN parameters...

It is quite awkward, but not insurmountable.

Thank you.