TroopLedger vs QuickBooks

[fred8033]

Our troop is in recovery mode. Membership and such is fine. The big issue is that our treasurer just surrendered being treasurer after insisting he could do it for the last eight months to a year and without doing much. So now, we need to re-create records, balance books and get things straightened out.

 

QuickBooks or TroopLedger ????

 

I have both. QuickBooks because of my business. TroopLedger because of previous treasurer. He said it's not easy to use though. I'd like to produce key financial statements for the troop, scout account reports and event specific profit/loss statements.

 

I've seen other discussions on this, but I could use more info. Can someone make a good argument for using one versus the other?

[fred8033]

Any unit treasurer's out there?

[Basementdweller]

geez, only giving it 5 hours for a reply????? patience.

 

A scout is thrifty.

 

We use google doc and their spreadsheet. the beauty is it is free, online and can be shared on multiple levels, some can view and others can edit. We track our Individual scout accounts and troop finances there.

 

Did I mention it was free.

[nolesrule]

If you have Quickbooks anyway and know how to use it, then use it. It'll do what you want.

 

But I wouldn't necessarily buy software just for it. Like Basement said, it can be done with spreadsheets. I've seen some great treasury reports done that way.

 

I'm treasurer for my business network organization chapter, and I use Quickbooks for tracking our finances, but only because I already have the program for 2 other businesses.

[Tampa Turtle]

We have a large unit and use Quickbooks. I think it is because there are usually a few mom's who do it for their husbands business and it is a know standard. I am sure it is a bit of overkill.

[fred8033]

Thanks for the advice.

 

We use spreadsheets for our pack to manage $25,000 going thru checking it works fine. BUT... the pack doesn't have scout accounts. That's the challenge. Without scout accounts, spreadsheets would be fine. As we transition treasurers and recover records, here's our current direction....

 

- We'll create an individual spreadsheet for every camp out, event, fundraiser AND FOR EACH DEPOSIT (check #, amount, purpose, credited scout, family on check if different). We'll "securely" store these so that everyone can't see them, but that key members can see them.

- If we use TroopLedger, we need to start thinking like TroopLedger.

- If we use QuickBooks, we create a chart of accounts to organize finances. We record scouts and leaders as "Customers". We record events (camps, specific fundraisers) as "Classes".

- Right now, the application choices are TroopLedger, QuickBooks and GnuCash. I did not find any on-line applications that could deal with this.

 

I had replied early because I saw the topic fall far down the visible radar. Anything older than a day on this forum seems to be pretty quiet. I probalby shouldn't have done that, but I hot looking for info.

 

[KC9DDI]

GnuCash is free, but probably has a steeper learning curve than your other options. If you have someone experienced with accounting and computer usage, it might work out well for you. Another free option is TurboCash (http://turbocash.net/) - it's probably a little easier than GnuCash, but still seems a little rough around the edges. At least you can try out the free ones to evaluate whether or not they'll work for you.

[krier32]

I'm pretty good with Quickbooks, but do not use for our Troop.

 

In theory you could track scout account by setting up a main checking account and then setting up sub-accounts (more checking accounts) under the main checking account and name each sub-account with a scout name or leader name. The main checking account should show the entire balance with the scout accounts showing their balances.

 

There are many different ways of working with quickbooks, someone else may have a better way of doing this than I do.

[DancesWithSpreadsheets]

First a disclaimer, I don't use Quickbooks or any of the other packages mentioned, so I don't know the specifics of those packages.

 

That said, from an accountant's standpoint, I think that Scout accounts should be treated as accounts payable, a liability (probable future cash outflow) that the unit owes to the individual scouts. Fundraising money comes in, you debit cash and credit A/P. Most accounting packages designed for small businesses should be able to handle A/P sub accounts (i.e. accounts for individual creditors that roll up to an overall control account for reporting purposes) so as long as you set it up that way they should be fairly easy to track.

 

HTH,

 

DWS

[fred8033]

Thanks for the input.... I received the pile-o-stuff from our troop treasurer last night. Nothing has been enetered after July 2010. Apparently, he had trouble with a computer crash and during recovery he had other trouble such as having to re-enter a scout year because he re-closed the previous scout year records and it reformatted the next year records with new initial values. Also, he showed how TroopLedger works. I was not impressed. Clunky old MFC interface. Fine for 1995. Poor for now. Problems entering dates in the account date field. Small dialog data entry windows don't resize causing alot of scrolling through long lists of scout names and adult leader names.

 

I'm going to try GnuCash first. If it does not work, QuickBooks.

 

- Scouts will be "customers" in GnuCash or QuickBooks.

- We'll keep our "chart of accounts" as simple as possible. No sub-accounts on a per-person basis. no sub-accounts on a specific economic event basis.

- We will have an account in the "chart of accounts" as a liability called something like "Scout accounts" or "Scout savings" or "Scout credit" or "Scout money".

- We will use "classes" to record specific economic events (a specific camp, a specific fundraiser, a specific equipment purchase).

- We will create an individual Excel spreadsheet for every camp out, event, fundraiser AND FOR EACH DEPOSIT (check #, amount, purpose, credited scout, family on check if different). We'll "securely" store these so that everyone can't see them, but that key members can see them. We'll use these as recovery points and to easily understand each event. Then, we'll report out of GnuCash or QuickBooks to see that records match.

 

 

Thanks for the advice and feed back everyone!

[gregwilley]

Fred, I realize your post is several years old. But I'd love to see the specific event spreadsheets that you're using to track each event.

[fred johnson]

GregWilley ... I sent you a private message.

[SeattlePioneer]

Personally, I use Quicken for my personal finances and a small Cub Pack.

 

<.

 

We have Scout Accounts, which are kept as separate Quicken accounts.

[fred johnson]

SeattlePioneer ... Same here. Quicken works great for the troop and pack.

[rishiforum]

I have the same issue, can anyone help me?