Today filed a 199-N for a California NPO with income under $25,000. With that income level, an electronic filing is needed. This is my first time with that form.
A few thoughts on the filing.
Month: March 2011
Going concern issues under SSARS 19
I have two posts at Attestation Update explaining how to address going concern issues under SSARS 19. The guidance found in SSARS 19 is rather brief. Here are the posts:
I won’t cross-post those comments to this blog. Please click the links above to read the discussion.
Update – SSARS 19 had been replaced by SSARS 21. All the reports have been revised. You can check out these posts at my other blog, Attestation Update:
- Flash update on SSARS #21
- Newly approved SSARS will allow a new service, ‘preparation’. Will also require written & signed engagement letters.
- Sample compilation report under SSARS 21
- Sample accountant’s review report for SSARS 21
- Video overview of SSARS 21
- New risk alerts for 2014/2015 are available
Convergence report from La Piana Consulting – part 1
I previously discussed an article by La Piana Consulting here and here and now would like to discuss their report Convergence – How Five Trends Will Reshape the Social Sector.
One of their key concepts is convergence. That is the title of their report, so I guess it would make sense that is the overriding issue. Their point is that not only are there some very major trends that are going to have a dramatic impact on the nonprofit community, but these trends will interact with each other to reinforce and compound change.
I can’t . . . translation: I won’t
Seth Godin talks about Accepting False Limits:
I will never be able to dunk a basketball.
This is beyond discussion.
Imagine, though, a co-worker who says, “I’ll never be able to use a knife and fork. No, I have to use my hands.”
Or a colleague who says, “I can’t possibly learn Chinese. I’m not smart enough.”
Q: Is a love offering collected for a pastor and used to pay student loan still taxable if the money doesn’t go directly to the pastor?
Want an easier way to present complex data to your board?
Consider dashboards.
Having a problem interpreting your 10 page financial statement to the board? Try turning key indicators into a green, yellow, or red light. Put several key pieces of data on a summary page and you have an easily understood report on where the organization stands.
Tragedy of Fraud – part 5 – becoming fodder for blog posts
One of the ripple effects when a fraud incident hits the papers is that you become fodder for snide comments in the blogosphere. I suppose the same thing would apply to any incident that hits the newspapers.
How to get 20 co-workers fired – today’s lesson on how NOT to use social media
Seems that a fellow who was doing some marketing work for Chrysler sent out a tweet criticizing the driving skills of Detroit drivers and threw in an obscenity for spice. He sent the tweet while stuck in traffic.
Unfortunately, he accidentally used the Chrysler brand twitter feed instead of his personal twitter account.
Oops.
Don’t have all your backup media on-site the day you swap out media
So you are taking backup data off-site on a regular basis. Good.
Your key staff person faithfully makes a daily backup of your server to a portable hard drive. Once a week this person dutifully brings in the portable hard drive used for last week’s daily backups. As directed, this person disconnects the portable drive with the newest data from the server, plugs the other one in to the server, then puts the drive with new data in her backpack to take it home that night.
What else could go wrong? Do you see the risk?
How could an auditor pick up any red flags to this corruption case?
I’m writing a series of posts on my other blog about a corruption indictment of officials in the city of Upland. The focus of that series of posts is a case study for CPAs based on a live, developing situation. Since the audience will be CPAs, I will not cross-post those discussions to this blog. If you’re interested, the posts start here and continue here and here.
Be careful with allowances paid to employees
If the allowances you provide to your staff aren’t handled correctly, the amount they receive can become taxable income. There are lots of things to say on this issue, but I will mention just a few.
Bryan Baughman has cautions at 2 Tips Related to Employee Allowances, posted at Faith-Based Accounting.
Take backup data off-site
What could go wrong in this picture?
Your church has three portable hard drives that are used to back up the server data. Every day one of your faithful staff dutifully swaps out the portable hard drive and makes a new, complete backup of your server. When a backup is complete, the portable hard drive with the fresh set of backup data is put on the shelf over the server, where it belongs.
What’s the problem?
Move the “Reply All” button to reduce the chance you will becoming the subject of a newspaper article
Various tales of disasters arising from people hitting the ‘reply all’ button were told in an article from yesterday’s Wall Street Journal. Simultaneously entertaining to see other’s embarrassment and fear-inducing that you could do the same thing. I’d like to give you a link so you can read the full article, but it looks like the WSJ doesn’t like that idea anymore.
Got a great idea from the article you might enjoy:
Move the ‘reply all’ button so you can’t accidentally hit it. Also requires a more intentional effort to choose that option.
Keep multiple generations of your computer backup data
Can you see the danger here?
A ministry faithfully backs up their computer data every day. They have two or three sets of media. Perhaps it is a tape that’s swapped every day or several different thumb drives that are alternated. When it’s time to make a new backup, the staff person faithfully grabs a backup media, making sure it is the oldest backup, puts it in the computer and successfully makes another backup. Next day the process is repeated.
What’s wrong?
What is your role in the game of life: initiator, copyeditor, or vandal?
In his post Who will say go?, Seth Godin describes three different kinds of people:
Here’s a little-spoken truth learned via crowdsourcing:
Most people don’t believe they are capable of initiative.