Reminder – two weeks left before deadline to file paperwork for overseas cash accounts

The June 30 deadline is rapidly approaching to file the FBAR reports for overseas bank accounts on which you have signature authority when the account holds $10,000 or more at any time during the year.

For mission organizations, think about those checking accounts you have in the field used to fund your local activities. If those accounts have more than $10,000 in them at any point during the year your organization has a filing requirement.

If you are in the finance area and have signature authority on one of those accounts, you personally have a filing requirement.

There’s no extension for the deadline. The penalties could get nasty.

Kelly Phillips Erb provides a great summary: IRS Issues Reminder As Taxpayers Near Deadline To Report Foreign Accounts, Assets.

Here is her technical summary:

(more…)

Jim Ulvog

Details on FTC enforcement action against four cancer charities – 2

This is the second in a series of posts diving deep into the detail mentioned in the complaint by the Federal Trade Commission and all Attorneys General against four named cancer charities.

My goal is to highlight some of the information that I think is of particular interest to the wider nonprofit community.

I perceive the attention paid to the complaint is drying up. Before discussing the FTC complaint, want to mention one interesting article of late:

6/1 – Suzanne Perry at Chronicle of Philanthropy – $187-Million Fraud Case Puts Charities on the Defensive – Article has reactions to the FTC and 50+ AGs going after the cancer charities that were so far over the line.

My description of the comments are they range from wondering what took the regulators so long to whether this is just a start.  Article points out there has been regulatory action against some members of this group for a long time (over 20 years with CFOA) but that doesn’t seem to have deterred additional problematic efforts.

One focus on the article is the limited staffing at the AG offices which limits how much they can focus on the charity sector. Various industry sources comment on the limits of self-regulation.

Back to the FTC complaint, which can be found here.  It is a public document. I assert journalist status, so will quote the document at length.

Here is the summary of the organizations’ activities, as interpreted by the FTC: (more…)

Jim Ulvog

Report says overall charitable giving in the US grew 5.4% in 2014

Indiana University’s report estimates overall charitable giving was up 5.4% in 2014. Total giving has recovered since the recession and has now has surpassed the previous high points in 2007 and 2005.

Chronicle of Philanthropy has more: Philanthropy Surges 5.4% to Record $358 Billion, Says “Giving USA”.

(more…)

Jim Ulvog

Preliminary indications are contributions to ECFA members grew about 6% in 2014

ECFA has announced preliminary results of their 2015 State of the Giving Report. First indications are based on 600 member organizations who have renewed through January 31st.

Cash contributions grew 5.9% year over year. Total revenue grew by 4.2%.

Final results expected in October.

Jim Ulvog

Details on FTC enforcement action against four cancer charities – 1

The news coverage has died down about enforcement action taken against four charities by the FTC and every state attorney general. I’ve not seen anything that dives a deep into the accusations. This post is the start of a series of discussions on the case.

Why go into detail?

After having read through the accusation, it is obvious this case contains most of the problematic issues we have seen over the last few years in nonprofit accounting and fundraising. Off the top of my head, I don’t recall any issues under discussion in the charity world that are not present in this case. That makes this set of allegations a good case study.

The complaint can be found here. That is a public document. I claim journalist status, so will quote the document at length.

Here is the opening of the complaint, with a few comments added: (more…)

Jim Ulvog

Creative visualization of World War II deaths

Here’s an example of visually presenting complex data:

It is really difficult to grasp 400,000 American battle deaths in WWII, or a million deaths at Stalingrad, or many millions of Chinese slaughtered by the Japanese, or the death from the 2 nukes or daily firebombing of Japan.

The Fallen of World War II does a superb job of putting the tragic cost into visual form. The video is 15 minutes and presents a huge amount of info.

If you are interested in history, especially military history, you will get a lot out of the presentation.

If you want to see a brilliant visualization and draw some ideas on how to present complex information, you will want to check it out.

You can see it on vimeo here.

Jim Ulvog

Brief tax articles for charities

Here are a few articles on my growing backlog of ideas of interest to charities. Quick updates on a variety of topics: general reminders, maintain control over funds sent overseas, FICA taxes on 403(b) contribution, short list of regs impacting a missionary sending church, and cell phones as de minimis fringe benefit.

12/10/14 – Ministry CPA – 5 Reminders about Charitable Contributions – Check out the article for quick summary of: (more…)

Jim Ulvog

Protecting a charity’s brand. Also, how do you hold an advocacy group accountable?

Here are two articles for your consideration. The first illustrates the idea that if you have a recognizable brand and you want to keep it for a long time, you probably ought to defend it. The second addresses the issue of how to hold organizations accountable for the context of outcome measures, in other words whether they are actually having any impact in the world.

5/7 – Steve Nardizzi at Huffington Post – Protecting the Nonprofit Brand – The CEO of Wounded Warrior Project gives a very persuasive explanation why WWP pursued litigation against charities that got too close to their name and their logo. If you’re building for the long-term and you want to have an impact for decades into the future you need to do a some things different from if you have an extremely short-term focus.

(more…)

Jim Ulvog

More followup on FTC action against 4 cancer charities

There is a lot more to say on the FTC and all AGs going after four charities that were way out of line.

5/19 – William P. Barrett at Forbes – Cancer Charities Agree to Dissolve Amid Fraud Claims – Article summarizes the case by the FTC. Two of the four charities have agreed to close their doors. Three of the named individuals have agreed they will not have future involvement with charity management or even fundraising.

We did nothing wrong and we agree not to break the law again

Article points out the irony we seen these kinds of settlements. Even though the three individuals agreed to not be involved in the charity sector again during their lifetime and two of the charities agreed to be taken over by receivers and then liquidated, the charities and individuals involved denied doing anything wrong.

It is as if it’s a normal and everyday thing that individuals agree to be legally barred from involvement in their economic sector and charities agree to corporate suicide when they have done nothing wrong.

But that’s the legal dance that is necessary. Denying wrongdoing is necessary to prevent the consent degree from becoming proof to anyone who later tried to sue the charities or individuals.  Even though I understand the reason, it seems silly to those looking in from the outside.

Contested claims

(more…)

Jim Ulvog

First glance at court filings in the FTC enforcement case

One cool thing I have learned while blogging is that lots of records for federal court proceedings are available in the federal Public Access to Court Electronic Records (PACER) system. After following the case of Scott London for a while, I’ve learned my way around PACER.

I have taken a quick look at the documents available in PACER for the enforcement action by the FTC and all state AGs against four cancer charities.

(more…)

Jim Ulvog

Survey of first day reporting on major FTC enforcement action

Here is a collection of the articles I found the day the FTC and all state Attorneys General took enforcement action against a group of four charities:

Update: A quote in the Chronicle of Philanthropy article provides a massive warning to the nonprofit community:

Hugh Jones, a charity regulator in Hawaii, said to his knowledge “this is the first time state charity regulators have aggressively pursued the deceptive use of gifts in kind.”

While this case looks to be extraordinarily extreme, there are a variety of issues that the FTC and every AG has now declared to be the fraud category. Anyone who has been paying attention knows the issues under discussion are not limited to these four charities. 

It isn’t too late to clean up policies, valuations, and modify some past filings.

Let those with ears to hear, hear.

FTC litigation

FTC press release which lists the names of the charities and key executives: (more…)

Jim Ulvog

First hint about the FTC enforcement actions to be announced later today

Last evening Mr. William P. Barrett (@WilliamPBarrett) tweeted:

FTC fundraising fraud lawsuit filed in Arizona federal court against #CancerFundOfAmerica and Cancer Support Services, but no individuals

Tweet has no link to articles but does point to the discussion of Cancer Fund of America at the America’s Worst Charities website. They are #2 on the list. Cancer Support Services isn’t on that list. After a cursory search, I can’t find any other discussion of the FTC’s action.

If that is a correct description of the targets of the enforcement action, you can start your reading by following that link.

The FTC announcement of a press conference is here.

I will be in a continuing education class all day so will follow any news sporadically. Haven’t decided if I’m going to step out of the class so I can listen in to the press conference. (I claim to be part of the media for this issue!) The scheduled time is in the middle of one of the most important classes.

If you have been reading this blog, you may want to pay attention to the coverage that seems likely to develop today.

Jim Ulvog

Major announcement from Federal Trade Commission on Tuesday

On 5/19 the FTC and State Attorneys General to Announce Action on a Major Consumer Fraud Case

I think there will be some major news tomorrow. This may be related to the work various AGs have been doing on GIKs. If my guess is correct there will be plenty of coverage tomorrow.

link: https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/press-releases/2015/05/ftc-state-attorneys-general-announce-action-major-consumer-fraud

 

Jim Ulvog