How can I record a gift card or voucher which has been donated?

This article explains how you can record the donation of a gift card or voucher and the purchases from it.

What transactions should I show?

When you are given a gift card, this is a donation to your organisation and you should record it as such. When you make purchases using the gift card, you should record these as expenditure, and upload receipts to ExpensePlus as usual. This way, the value of the gift card will be included in your annual income, and the value of the purchases from the card will be included in the expenditure of your annual accounts too.

How should I show this on ExpensePlus?

The easiest way to set this up in ExpensePlus is via a new Petty Cash account.

Step 1 - add a new Petty Cash account

You can follow the instructions in this help guide article to add a new Petty Cash account. The simplest method is to only use this Petty Cash account for the gift card in question, and you might want to add the name of the gift card into the account name.

See this help guide article to ensure the necessary ExpensePlus users have access to the new Petty Cash account.

Step 2 - add a Petty Cash income transaction for the value of the donation

You need to recognise the donation of the gift card in your organisation's income, so you need to add a Petty Cash income transaction into this new Petty Cash account for the value of the gift card. This will set the balance of the Petty Cash account as the balance of the gift card.

You should record this transaction as "Other income". See this help guide article for instructions on how to add Petty Cash income.

Step 3 - record Petty Cash expenditure

As you make purchases from the gift card, these need to be recorded as Petty Cash expenditure transactions. When you add these transactions, you can set the supplier and upload receipts as you would for a business card purchase. Petty Cash expenditure transactions ask for a payee - this can just be set to the name of the person who made the purchase.

For more information on adding Petty Cash expenditure transactions, see this help guide article.

Step 4 - close the Petty Cash account after the gift card is fully spent

Once you have spent all of the money on the gift card, the balance of the Petty Cash account will return to £0. You can then close the Petty Cash account as it won't be required any longer. See this help guide article for instructions on how to close the account.

Frequently Asked Questions

My last transaction was partly paid by the gift card and partly by another method - how can I show this?

In this scenario, you'll need to record the Petty Cash expenditure and expenditure by your other payment method separately in ExpensePlus, and ensure the amount entered for the two transactions represents the portion paid by that payment method.

For example, if you had £6.00 remaining on your gift card, and made a purchase for £10 with the remainder being an expense claim, you would add a Petty Cash expenditure transaction from the gift card account for £6.00 (which would bring the balance of that account to £0, as the gift card was fully spent), and upload the same receipt as an expense claim for the remaining £4.

If the gift card was donated by a named donor with a valid Gift Aid declaration, can I claim Gift Aid on the donation?

Government advice says that Gift Aid cannot be claimed on gift vouchers. If your donor wishes to donate in a tax-efficient way, they should instead give a cash gift (via cash, cheque, or bank transfer) to your organisation with which you can purchase a gift card. You can then claim Gift Aid on this gift and, if you like, purchase a gift card to the value of the donation and its Gift Aid (see the following section).

How does this work if my organisation received a cash donation and purchased the gift card ourselves?

In this case, you should:

1. Record the named donation from the donor as usual
2. Claim Gift Aid on it as usual
3. Set up a new Petty Cash account as per step 1, above
4. When you purchase the gift voucher, rather than recording the income at that point, record the purchase of the gift voucher as a Withdrawal of Petty Cash (as you have already recorded income to your organisation by recording the named donation). This effectively transfers this amount of money to a different account in your organisation. Expenditure will not be recorded at this point, but will be recorded when you make purchases from the gift card. See this help guide article for instructions on how to record a Petty Cash withdrawal.
5. Follow steps 3 and 4 above to record expenditure and close the account.