Claiming Gift Aid using Give A Little

When a donor gives to your church or charity via a Give A Little platform, they can submit Gift Aid details so you can claim Gift Aid on their donation.

Given that this Gift Aid data is stored in Give A Little's platform, ExpensePlus assumes that Gift Aid will be claimed on any Give A Little donations via the Give A Little platform.

Therefore any donations in ExpensePlus where the donation method is recorded as Give A Little will be automatically excluded from Gift Aid claims.

There is no issue with claiming Gift Aid on donations through Give A Little separately from claiming all other Gift Aid through ExpensePlus. HMRC will accept Gift Aid claims from your charity from multiple sources.

Indeed, because the Gift Aid declaration data for donors who have given via Give A Little is within Give A Little and not ExpensePlus it is typically more efficient to claim Gift Aid on GiveALittle donations through GiveALittle.

The main drawback to this, is that Give A Little doesn't currently integrate with HMRC. Whilst Give A Little provides all of the data youneed to make a Gift Aid Claim, the you need to submit the claim manually via the HMRC portal.

Therefore, some churches and charities prefer to claim the Gift Aid on GiveALittle donations via ExpensePlus instead. However this involves:

a) manually transferring across the Gift Aid declaration and entering this into ExpensePlus and

b) ensuring the donation method is set to 'card' rather than 'GiveALittle (see instructions for this below).

Claiming Gift Aid through Give A Little

If you want to claim Gift Aid on donations through Give A Little, please see the Give A Little support pages.

For details on how to reconcile income through Give A Little within ExpensePlus, please see this helpguide article.

In terms of Gift Aid, as long as the donation method is set to 'Give A Little', then ExpensePlus will automatically know to exclude these donations from any Gift Aid claims within ExpensePlus. This avoids duplication. Find out more here about which donations are included in ExpensePlus Gift Aid claims.

Claiming Gift Aid on Give A Little donations through ExpensePl

1. Transfer Gift Aid declarations

It is not possible to claim Gift Aid on any named donation in ExpensePlus where the donor does not have an active Gift Aid declaration within ExpensePlus.

Therefore, if your donors have submitted a Gift Aid declaration via Give A Little, you will need to export this and store it within ExpensePlus.

You can either:

a) Add the declaration to each donor record: How do I add / edit / cancel a Gift Aid declaration? OR

b) Bulk import donor information, which will update any existing donor records.

If you wish to attach a digital copy of the declaration to the donor record in ExpensePlus, we recommend you save the Give A Little screen as a PDF. Usually, you can print to PDF using your browser’s print dialogue box. Then upload this PDF to ExpensePlus. Alternatively, you can take a screenshot and attach an image file.

2. Donations are coded as Named Donations (or GASDS) and to the correct fund

ExpensePlus will only claim Gift Aid on income coded as Named Donations, and will only claim GASDS on income coded as GASDS Donations. Furthermore, ExpensePlus won’t claim Gift Aid on any income in funds which have not been set as eligible for Gift Aid in the fund settings screen. You should therefore check that:

• Your appropriate funds are set as being eligible for Gift Aid, in the fund settings screen
• Your income from Give A Little is coded appropriately as either Named Donations or GASDS Donations, not as 'Other Income', in the bank statement screen.
• Your income from Give A Little is coded to the correct fund, in the bank statement screen.

3. Change donation method of donations to Card

As mentioned above, ExpensePlus will not claim Gift Aid on any donations with the donation method Give A Little. To claim Gift Aid on Give A Little donations through ExpensePlus, these donations therefore need to have the donation method Card.

You will need to amend the donation method of any previous Give A Little donations for which you now wish to claim Gift Aid through ExpensePlus. This needs to be done manually per transaction but can be changed for any future quick matched donations (see guidance below).

To do this, click into the income transaction (from the bank statement screen, or your income reports), and change the donation method of the transaction from Give A Little to Card.

4. Amend remembered transactions

Next you should update any remembered transaction any remembered transactions relating to Give A Little donations.

When these are quick matched, they will have the donation method Card (which is eligible for Gift Aid in ExpensePlus), rather than Give A Little (which is not). To do this, follow the steps below:

1. Navigate to the Bank Reconciliation module
2. Select the Match Transactions screen for any bank account
3. Click Manage Remembered Transactions in the top right hand corner
4. Choose Named Donations from the drop down menu
5. For each remembered transaction entry, click into the line in the table and in the popup that appears change the Donation Method from Give A Little to Card and click Submit.
6. Back on the Manage Remembered Transactions screen, choose GASDS Donations from the drop down menu
7. For each remembered transaction entry, click into the line in the table and in the popup that appears change the Donation Method from Give A Little to Card and click Submit.

5. Make Gift Aid claim

You are now ready to begin claiming Gift Aid in ExpensePlus.

To do this, you will need to ensure your Gift Aid settings are set correctly: How do I create a Gift Aid Claim?

If a donor changes their details or Gift Aid eligibility

If a donor contacts you to make changes to (or end) their Gift Aid declaration which they originally submitted via Give A Little, you’ll need to remember to change (or end) their declaration both on the Give A Little system and on ExpensePlus.