Overview
The Gifts subtab on the Giving tab displays gifts that have been received by your institution. Gifts represent completed giving transactions, including outright contributions, payments toward pledges, planned gift realizations, matching gift payments, and other received revenue transactions.
Use the Gifts subtab to enter new gifts, review existing gifts, connect gifts to related giving activity, add soft credits or tributes, and make corrections when needed.
Enter a gift
To enter a gift from a record:
- Open the person, company, or foundation record.
- Select the Giving tab.
- Select the Gifts subtab.
- Select New Gift.
- Complete the required gift fields.
- Add any connections, soft credits, tributes, or additional details.
- Select Save.
Gifts can also be entered through Batch Gift Entry. The standard gift fields described in this article apply to both individual gift entry and batch entry.
Video: Entering a Gift from a Donor's Record
Gift fields
The gift entry form includes required fields, optional fields, and additional sections for related giving information.
| Field | Description |
|---|---|
| *Amount | The amount of the received gift. This field is required. |
| Fair Market Value | The value of any goods or services the donor received in exchange for the gift, such as tickets, merchandise, or other benefits. This field appears when Add FMV is selected. |
| Tax Amount | The tax-deductible amount of the gift. Slate calculates this by subtracting the Fair Market Value from the Amount. |
| Payment | Used when collecting payment at the time the gift is recorded. Select Collect Payment to enter payment account and amount information. |
| Fulfilling | Used to connect the gift to an existing pledge, planned gift, or potential matching gift when the received gift fulfills another giving commitment. |
| *Fund | The fund designation associated with the gift. This field is required. |
| *Type | The type of gift being entered. This field is required. Gift types are configured using the Gift Type prompt. |
| *Status | The status of the gift. By default, gifts are typically entered with a received status. Additional gift statuses may configured using the Gift Status prompt. |
| Date | The date the gift was received. |
Use the FAST acronym to remember the required fields for a gift: Fund, Amount, Status, and Type.
Connect the gift to related activity
Gifts can be connected to other advancement records to support campaign tracking, proposal management, reporting, and stewardship.
| Connection | Description |
|---|---|
| Opportunity | Connects the gift to an existing opportunity or proposal. |
| Campaign | Connects the gift to a fundraising campaign. |
| Appeal | Connects the gift to the appeal associated with the gift. |
| Fulfilling | Connects the gift to a pledge, planned gift, or potential matching gift that the gift is fulfilling. |
When a gift fulfills another giving record, Slate uses that relationship to update the fulfillment context for the related pledge, planned gift, or matching gift workflow.
Add soft credits
Soft credits allow additional people or organizations to receive recognition for a gift without changing the hard-credit donor.
Use soft credits when another record should receive recognition for the gift, such as a spouse, household member, solicitor-connected constituent, donor-advised fund contact, or other related record.
The Soft Credits section can include suggested soft credits based on the donor’s relationships. Suggested soft credits are configured by the relationship type prompt.
To add a soft credit:
- Locate the Soft Credits section within the gift form.
- Select a suggested soft credit, or search for another record.
- Select a soft credit type, if applicable.
- Enter an amount override, if the soft credit amount should differ from the gift amount.
If no amount override is entered, the soft credit follows the gift amount. Use amount overrides when only part of the gift should be recognized for the soft-credit recipient.
Add tributes
Tributes identify gifts made in honor or memory of another person or organization.
To add a tribute:
- Locate the Tributes section.
- Select an occasion, such as In Honor Of or In Memory Of.
- Search for and select the honoree record, or enter a free-text honoree name.
- Add additional tributes if needed.
Institutions can manage tribute occasions using the Prompts tool. A single gift can include multiple tributes, and each tribute can use a different occasion. For example, one gift can be made in honor of one person and in memory of another.
If the honoree is selected as a Slate record, the gift appears on that record’s Honored By subtab. If the honoree is entered only as free text, the name is stored on the gift, but the gift is not linked to a specific record’s Honored By subtab.
Add gift details
The Details section stores additional information about the gift.
| Field | Description |
|---|---|
| User | Defaults to the current user but can be changed. This can be used to track the user associated with the gift entry, solicitation, or processing workflow. |
| Notes | Stores internal notes about the gift. |
| Anonymous | Indicates that the donor’s name should be hidden in external publications or recognition contexts. |
| External ID | Stores an identifier from another system. This can be useful for imports, exports, integrations, or matching records across systems. |
Custom fields
Custom gift fields appear in the Custom Fields section of the gift entry form.
Institutions can use custom gift fields to capture additional gift-specific information that is not stored in the standard fields. Custom fields appear alphabetically within this section.
What Slate does automatically
When a gift is saved, Slate stores the gift on the current record and updates connected giving information where applicable.
Depending on the gift details, Slate also:
- Calculates the tax amount based on the gift amount and fair market value.
- Connects the gift to a pledge, planned gift, or potential matching gift selected in the Fulfilling field.
- Applies soft credit recognition based on selected soft credits and any amount overrides.
- Displays linked tribute gifts on an honoree record’s Honored By subtab when the honoree is selected as a Slate record.
- Preserves audit history for gift creation and changes.
Save or split the gift
When finished, select one of the available save options.
| Option | Description |
|---|---|
| Save | Saves the gift and adds it to the record’s Gifts subtab. |
| Save and Split | Saves the current gift and opens a new gift entry form with information pre-populated. Gifts created through this process share a gift group GUID. |
Use Save and Split when a single giving transaction should be divided across multiple funds.
Correct or reverse a gift
Gift corrections should preserve a clear audit trail. The appropriate correction method depends on what needs to change.
Use standard editing when a simple update is appropriate and permitted by institutional policy.
Use a reversal when the original transaction should deleted. Reversals are commonly used when a gift needs to be voided or backed out while preserving the history of the original entry.
Use the edit with reversal option when a gift needs to be changed or updated while preserving the history of the original entry. This typically occurs when changing designations or amounts after the original entry and processing of the gift.
If a gift was entered on the wrong record, use the gift reassignment workflow rather than recreating the gift manually. Reassignment preserves the audit trail by reversing the gift on the original record and creating the corresponding gift on the destination record.
Troubleshooting
A gift does not appear on the expected record
Confirm that the gift was saved on the correct person, company, or foundation record. If the gift was entered on the wrong record, use the reassign option to move the gift to the appropriate record.
A pledge or planned gift is not available in the Fulfilling field
Confirm that the pledge or planned gift exists, is associated with the current record or an eligible related record, and is still available for fulfillment.
A tribute gift does not appear on the honoree’s Honored By subtab
Confirm that the honoree was selected as a Slate record in the Tributes section. If the honoree was entered only as free text, the name is stored on the gift, but the gift is not associated with a specific honoree record.
A soft credit amount is different than expected
Review the soft credit amount override. If no override is entered, the soft credit follows the gift amount. If an override is entered, that value determines the recognition amount for the soft-credit recipient.
Summary
The Gifts subtab is the primary place to enter and review received giving transactions. A gift can stand alone as an outright contribution, or it can connect to pledges, planned gifts, matching gifts, opportunities, campaigns, appeals, soft credits, and tributes.
Use the gift entry form to capture the received transaction, add the appropriate context, and preserve clear relationships between the gift and the other advancement activity it supports.