response 1 of 72:

Jul 10 05:12 UTC 1998

Request IRS Catalog No. 20054Q (or its most current incarnation). It
may be on the web. The title is "Charitable Contributions - Substantiation
and Disclosure Requirements". 

Written acknowledgements are only *required* for donations in excess of
$250. For that reason, I would opine that e-mail acknowledgements for
smaller donations would be fine, especially coupled with an offer to
provide a written acknowledgement. The acknowledgement should, in any
case, be sent as quickly as possible, if only to indicate appreciation
for the donation (and keep them coming.....). 

response 3 of 72:

Jul 10 13:09 UTC 1998

Re #1: I do send the e-mail acknowledgement as quickly as possible, for the
reason you state.  But it would save time and money if I could send out paper
receipts only at the end of the year.  (And people who make more than one
donation in the course of the year would only need to save one receipt.)

response 5 of 72:

Jul 10 15:33 UTC 1998

I would think that in most cases an "end of the tax year" reciept would be more
than adequate.  (Maybe even better, since you don't have as much time to lose
it before you file your taxes.)

I also think that a mention that paper reciepts are available for tax purposes
attached to the e-mail acknowledgement and perhaps another toward the end of
the last quarter should be enough.

My opinion, of course, and I know nothing about these things.

response 7 of 72:

Jul 13 04:40 UTC 1998

A question I've been wondering about, and have been meaning to research.
How do we handle auctions donations?

Suppose Dee donates an object and Bee buys it for 10 dollars. 
Presumably, we need to figure out the value of the object, say V
dollars, and Dee gets credit for a donation to Grex of V dollars, while
Bee gets credit for a donation to Grex of 10-V dollars.  That seems
obvious enough.

But how do we come up with the value V?

And what if V is greater than 10?  Should we always set the minimum bid
at V dollars to ensure this doesn't happen?  If we publicize the "value"
of an object, would that discourage people from bidding above that
value?

response 9 of 72:

Jul 13 19:08 UTC 1998

I searched around on the IRS site and found reference to the publication Rane
mentioned.  It's number has chenged and it's not on the web site, but I called
up and ordered it, so in theory I should get it in the next 2 weeks.

I also found (on the IRS site) what looks like a plain-English version of the
rules on receipts, and I downloaded that but haven't yet digested it.  At
a glance, it appears that waiting till the end of the year may be OK for a
"substantiation" receipt, which is the thing you use to claim a deduction on
your taxes.  However there is also the concept of a "disclosure notice", which
is something you send donors to tell them how much the thing they got in
return for their donation is worth, ala Rane's magazine example above.  The
disclosure notice must be sent out in a "timely" manner, which I think means
we couldn't wait until the end of the year.

I don't think we need to send out any disclosure notices, however, since we
don't normally send out stuff in response to donations (other than a copy of
the Grex handbook, which is small enough not to count).  This is the part I
want to make sure of, though, so I need to read the regs carefully.

I'm thinking that the Accounting Aid Society, which we used to belong to,
might be worth turning to for help.  Perhaps they could give us some
definitive answers.  We might have to rejoin them, which would cost $25 per 
year.  danr, do you have any thoughts on that suggestion?