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How to Track Grants and Grant Payments in PatronManager: https://help.pm.leapevent.tech/a/1028717
There are many phases in the grant process, from preparing application materials, to hopefully receiving the awarded funds; PatronManager provides the tools to track the grant process from start to finish.
We've set up two Donation record types for grant tracking - a parent Grant record and a child Grant Payment record. In this article, let's pretend your organization applied for a grant from the Rose Apothecary Foundation to foster your burgeoning LGBTQIA youth programming initiatives. We'll walk you through:
- How to create a new Grant record
- The Grant is the overarching record - you'll use it to track the application through every step of the process, and as a place to aggregate individual payments once they start to come in.
- How to create Grant Payment records
- Grant Payments are single records of individual payments from the grant-issuing organization. They live on the Grant record and add up to the total amount of the Grant.
- Some tips on Grant reporting
Then, at the end, we have some Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs).
Let's go!
1. How to create a new Grant record
When you record a grant, you'll start on the Account issuing the grant. The "New Grant" action creates a Grant record from the Account record with the click of a button.
The resulting Grant record has stages to track where you are in the grant process. If you receive the grant, the Grant record will also serve as a container for tracking grant payments.
1. Navigate to the Account of the organization issuing the grant
2. Click the "New Grant" action
The "New Grant" action appears in the highlights panel on the upper right of the Account record.
Don't see the "New Grant" action? Head over to this article to add it.
3. The Grant name will auto-populate on the quick form - put the amount you expect to receive in the Grant Amount field
In our example, we're applying for a $30,000 grant by the Rose Apothecary Foundation
4. Choose a stage that best describes where you are in the application process
We just heard about the grant and want to apply for it, so we'll put this Grant in the Grant Prep stage.
As you traverse the grant process, update the Grant record to reflect your progress!
5. Fill in the date and description fields:
- Close Date: Use this field to record the date you expect to find out whether you've received the grant
- Description: Put any useful information about the grant for you and your colleagues
- Application Deadline: Use this field to record the date the application is due
- Click "Save"
You just created a Grant record!
To access the Grant record, hover over Donations in the Quick Links section and click on the Grant record.
6. As you move through the application and review process, you can return to the donation record and click "Edit"
7. Update the stage and click "Save"
8. When you update the stage, the Sales Path on the Grant record will also update
Snazzy!
2. How to track grant payments
Congratulations! You've just been awarded the grant you applied for. Now it's time to track the payments with the "New Grant Payment" action on the Grant record.
The "New Grant Payment" action creates a Grant Payment record from the Grant record, connecting it to the parent Grant record and retaining crucial information from the Grant without having to enter it all again.
For accurate Reports and Accounts Receivable tracking, you'll want to create the Grant Payments after your grant has been awarded. Even though you haven't received all your Payments yet, it's important to indicate that you will. Let's walk through how to track Grant Payments properly.
1. Navigate to the Grant record and click on the "New Grant Payment" action
The "New Grant Payment" action appears in the highlights panel on the upper right of the Donation Grant record.
Don't see the "New Grant Payment" action? Head over to this article to add it.
2. Fill in the grant payment information and click "Save":
- Donation Name: auto-populates the grantor name along with today's date
- Amount: enter the payment amount
- Stage: This defaults to "Posted". If the payment hasn't come in yet, change the stage to "Not Posted"
- Close Date: auto-populates today's date. Adjust it if you expect the payment go come in at a later date
- Payment Type: If you know how the grantor will send payments, fill this in now; if not, leave it blank for now
- Donor: Leave this blank for now
3. Woohoo! You just created a Grant Payment record. Hover over the "Payments" link in the Related List Quick Links section and click on the record you just created
4. You're ready to set up the other Grant Payment records - click "Clone"
5. Make the following changes - future you will be so happy you did!
- Donation Name: Update the date of the donation name to the date you expect to receive the grant
- Amount: Update if this installment will be a different amount
- Close Date: Change to the date you expect to receive the grant payment.
- Click "Save"
6. Repeat until you create all the expected Grant Payments
Grant reporting tips
When you report on Donations, you can include a filter for Donation Record Type to make sure you only see money you have actually received. To report on payments you've received rather than the entire grant, include "Grant Payment" but not "Grant".
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
If you start tracking a Grant in PatronManager and then don't receive it, you can set the Stage to "Grant Denied"
When you do this, it's also a good idea to add some notes in the Description field of the Grant for why the Grant was denied. Then, you can take a look at this record next year to improve your grant application!
Similarly, you can use the Description field to make notes of Group Sales that were canceled or marked as "Not Interested" or Major Gifts that weren't won!
The Reporting Deadline and Reporting Requirements fields are useful (and reportable!) ways that you can track when reports for a Grant are due and what reports specifically need to be pulled.
When reports are ready, you can either link to them in the Reporting Requirements fields or in Chatter.
If you want to track other details about your Grants and are already using the Description field to track other information about the Grant, you can add custom fields to fit your needs.
After creating your custom field(s), make sure to add them to your page layout for Grants so that you can actually see and use them!
To help set you up for success, we’ve put guidelines together to help you avoid interfering with PatronManager functionality, corrupting your data, and to prevent negative impacts to your customizations due to PatronManager product upgrades.