Nonprofit finance, accounting, and tax news. Other tidbits of interest to the charity community.
The cut off for organizations being able to file a 199N with the California Franchise Tax Board instead of the longer 199 is gross revenue normally $25,000 or less. The cut off to file a 990-N instead of the longer 990-EZ with the IRS is $50,000.
What to do if your income is between 25,000 and 50,000?
I have a post up on my other blog addressing this question. You can find it here, since I won’t be cross posting the entry.
Starting January 1, 2011, very small tax-exempt organizations in California must file an e postcard with the state Franchise Tax Board. This is very similar to the federal e-postcard. Form FTB 199N is used for the FTB while Form 990-N is used with the IRS.
Key things you need to know:
Previous posts here and here for background.
There are a few comments worth repeating from the the ECFA’s webinar on the formation of their Commission on Accountability and Policy for Religious Organizations. The Commission will provide input to the Senate Finance Committee. A few of my thoughts as well.
Sen. Charles Grassley has asked ECFA to lead an independent, private sector commission to provide input on some of the major accountability and policy issues affecting the religious nonprofit community, particularly churches. Previous post here. ECFA’s press release here.
Dan Williams, of PSK, an accounting firm in Arlington, Texas, has some comments at Faith-Based Accounting.
In a webinar on January 14, Michael Batts, CPA and Dan Busby, CPA and President of ECFA, gave background on the Commission and what it will be addressing.
Here are a few of the issues on the commission’s plate:
Yesterday I listened to the ECFA webinar on the new commission they have formed to provide input to the US Senate on accountability and policy issues affecting churches. Press release is here.
I will have several posts on the issue. First some background.
I have discussed the differences between audits, reviews, and compilations here and here. Even developed a visual illustration here. Ask any CPA and you can get a long explanation of the distinctions.
For something shorter, consult this article by Angus Loten in the Wall Street Journal, which said:
The series of posts on looking into the future have been combined into one page. This allows you to read the posts in chronological order. You can find them in the “Peering Forward” tab at the top of this page or you can click here.
Amity Shlaes, in her current Forbes column, Economics by Cartoon, points out that the cartoon Quantitative Easing Explained and the rap debate between Keynes and Hayek have received 3.5 million and 1.7 million hits on YouTube, respectively. I’ve mentioned these videos here on this blog and here on my other blog. (Just checked – the QE cartoon is up to 4.0 million visits.)
Over 5.7 million hits on YouTube video explanations of what is going on? Why?
“My will shall shape my future. Whether I fail or succeed shall be no man’s doing but my own. I am the force; I can clear any obstacle before me, or I can be lost in a maze. My choice, my responsibility, win or lose, only I hold the key to my destiny. ”
Another article describing how the bad guys are using ‘phishing’ emails to plant key-stroke loggers on unsuspecting small business computers and thus gaining bank account log ins. Eventually crooks clean out a lot of money before getting detected or the account is drained. Frequently, the banks can walk away from any liability since the log-in data appeared to be legit and the problem originated on the customers computer. Wall Street Journal article here.
Preventive techniques suggested in article:
The last half of the article by La Piana Consulting in the Winter 2010 Outcomes has a section title that says Be a Futurist. In this section they talk at length about how organizations can learn about the changes going on, study them, and then adapt.
This will require studying the changes around us, listening to uncomfortable analysis, and putting forth the serious intellectual effort to grasp new things. That is essentially becoming a futurist.
Making that transition will be hard. (more…)