You are now able to reassign categories for financial transactions. That is to say, if you have an obsolete category, and you wish to move all the activity to a new category. you can now do so in one action.
If you wish, you can delete the old category once the activity moves.
Here’s a two-minute demonstration of this feature.
Frequently, when congregants make contributions, they include requests to inform others about the gift. Until now, the system dutifully created precisely one letter per individual. For example, if David Davies contributed $18 to a fund, and wished to inform Earl Everett and Eva Everett about the contribution, the system produced a letter to David (as the contributor), a letter to Earl, and a letter to Eva.
With this change, the system recognizes those cases where the honorees reside in the same household, and produces one letter per household
This video illustrates a case, where, in fact, the last names of the honorees are different, but reside in the same household. You’ll see in the video one letter to the honoree’s household.
The payment portal, sometimes called the non-logged-in portal, and sometimes called the contribution portal, has a new wrinkle.
Until now, the portal was purely a means to accept contributions. Now, though, if you do indeed create charges for items such as school tuition or pledges, you’ll see the portal looking for such receivables against which it will apply payments.
Sounds awfully wordy and complicated. Please watch this short (3m, 42s) video to see how this works.
Primarily to control what appears in the two user portals, you now have the ability to archive financial categories.
What do we mean by “archive?” You might think of it as a way to retire a no-longer-used category. Or, perhaps, you might have categories that you use internally. In fact, if your organization is more comfortable with a term such as “close” or “make private”, we can accommodate that wish quite easily.
The main point is simple–when you archive financial categories, those do not show up in either the general payment screen or the logged-in user portal.
For more background on the portals, please see these articles.
Here is a video (3:40) that shows how to archive a category, and its effect on the contribution portal.
As seen in the December, 2018 post, you’ve had the option of asking your contributors if they’d like to absorb card processing fees, bundled into their contribution. As originally set up, you could determine:
With today’s change, you’ll have the option of automatically including the fee. In this case, the contributor would not have the option of declining.
Here’s a short (4 minute) video illustrating how this works.
Now available–a consolidated Bimah list.
We’ve added another button to the Yahrzeit query. Just a little background would be in order. On the Yahrzeit query, the top half of the screen shows all the Yahrzeits matching the Hebrew date range. Conversely, the bottom half of the screen shows all the Yahrzeits matching the Gregorian dates that you’ve entered.
If your congregation concentrates on one or the other — all Hebrew or all Gregorian — you can use the long-standing buttons to create a Hebrew or Gregorian Bimah list.
On the other hand, if your congregation has a mixture, the new Combination Bimah List button will serve you well.
With this button, the system combines the Hebrew lines with the Gregorian lines, to give you one list. Along the way, at your option, it sorts by the dates the Yahrzeits occur, according to the Yahrzeit observer.
If you haven’t used the Yahrzeit area before, you might find it helpful to have a look at this instructional article and video.
Or, if you’d like to see the new “Combo” Bimah list in action, here’s a link that will step through the process.
You’ll see three improvements within Yahrzeit queries. Those changes are as follows:
Here’s an under-four-minute video that runs through these improvements within Yahrzeit queries.
You can now produce letters for families, driven by the family/household query.
ShalomCloud has offered a number of different ways to communicate with your congregation. For example, you can send Yahrzeit reminders by letter or by email. Similarly, you can send acknowledgments for contributions by letter or email. When reaching out to individual members, you can use email or text messaging. Finally, at the family/household level, you could print envelopes or labels.
However–one thing was missing–namely, the ability to create a general letter, intended for either the entire congregation, or to a selection of families. We have filled that gap.
Here’s a short (3:39) video illustrating the new capability, Letters for Families.
When producing a synagogue directory, you’ll now have a few more choices.
In the initial roll-out of the synagogue directory, there weren’t any options. The program simply created a document of all your Active families, in two columns, on 8 1/2 by 11 paper. Just three mouse clicks would create that directory.
Since that initial announcement, we’ve add a few things. First, you can select which families to include, based on the billing status [Active, Associate, Friends, etc]. Also, you can select by family attribute(s). Moreover, there is a special attribute to exclude a family entirely from the directory.
The newest set of options provides one more selection criteria. If you’ve marked your individual members with the Role within Family (see this link for details), you can indicate which roles to include. For example, if you’ve marked roles such as Adult and Child, you can specify that only Adults would appear in the directory.
As mentioned above, the directory had been available in one format, and one format only–8 1/2 x 11 paper, in two columns. Now, you can designate your paper size (for example, 8 1/2 inches tall, 5 1/2 inches wide), and whether you want a one-column format or a two-column format.
This video (8 m, 18s) runs through these options.
Certainly, if you’d like to help setting up these directory templates, feel free to reach out to us.
This post runs through most aspects of updating Yahrzeits, especially connecting members of your congregation to their loved ones who have passed away.
The video also shows how to
In contrast to most of our posts, which announce new features, this is meant as an instructional video. Enjoy.
