Giving Summaries

A giving summary is a statement that lists a donor's gifts for a period, such as a calendar year, with their total. Use it when a donor asks for a record of their giving, or to send every donor a year-end statement. This article explains what a giving summary includes, how to create one for many donors or for a single donor, and how it differs from an official receipt. It is written for Salesforce administrators and the staff who run receipting.

Giving Summary or Official Receipt?

A giving summary is not an official tax receipt. It is a record of giving, created alongside your receipts, and it never replaces or changes them.

	Official receipt (single or consolidated)	Giving summary
Purpose	Tax receipt for income tax purposes	Statement of the donor's giving
Gifts included	Only gifts that are eligible and not yet receipted	All received gifts in the period, receipted or not
Effect on gifts	Gifts become "Receipted" and point to the receipt	None: Receipt Status and Last Receipt don't change
Can be repeated	No: a gift is receipted once (or voided and replaced)	Yes: create as many as you need
Numbering	Your receipt numbering	Separate, using the Summary Prefix (for example SUM-)
Template	Donation or Acknowledgment template	Giving Summary template

Which Gifts Are Included

A giving summary includes every gift the donor made in the period you choose, based on each gift's Payment Date:

Your org receipts by	Gifts included
Opportunity (Enable Receipt by Payment = No)	All "Closed Won" Opportunities whose Payment Date (the date of the last payment, or the Close Date if there are no payments) falls in the period.
Payment (Enable Receipt by Payment = Yes)	All "Paid" Payments whose Payment Date falls in the period.

Because a summary is a record of giving, not a tax receipt, gifts are included whatever their Receipt Status: already receipted, below the minimum, marked Do Not Receipt, acknowledgments, in-kind gifts and recurring donation installments are all listed.

One Summary per Donor

Gifts are grouped by donor, and each donor gets one summary for the period:

• Individuals and families (Household Accounts): grouped under the gift's primary contact.
• Organizations: grouped under the Account.

The summary shows the period's start and end dates, the total donation amount, the total receiptable amount, and the total advantage. Its template can also list each gift (see Building the Summary Template below).

No minimum amount. The Minimum Receipt Amount in Receipt Settings applies only to official receipts. Giving summaries are created for every donor with gifts in the period, however small the total.

Creating Giving Summaries

For Many Donors: Batch Receipts

1. Open Batch Receipts and choose the Create giving summaries option for Opportunities, or for payments if you receipt by payment.
2. Choose how to select gifts:
   • Payment Date: last calendar year, this calendar year, or custom start and end dates.
   • Optionally, limit it to up to 20 specific donors by Primary Contact (Contact when receipting by payment) or Account.
3. Review the number of gifts found, then click Create Giving Summaries. For small selections, you can choose which gifts to include.
4. The giving summaries and their .pdfs are created in the background, and the last screen shows their progress. Click Finish once both steps are complete, or leave the page and let the job finish on its own. Batch Receipt Logs show when the job has finished and whether any errors occurred.

For One Donor: New Giving Summary

1. Open the donor's Contact (individuals and families) or Account (organizations).
2. Click New Giving Summary.
3. Choose the period: last calendar year, this calendar year, or custom dates.
4. Confirm. The summary is created for that donor's gifts in the period.

Both options need the Receipt User or Receipt Admin permission set.

Templates, Numbering and Delivery

Which Template Is Used

Each summary uses a Giving Summary template, in the donor's receipt language (English or French):

1. the Giving Summary template on the gift's Receipting Account, if you use Receipting Accounts and one is set
2. otherwise, Receipt Template – Giving Summary (EN / FR) on the Templates page of Settings

Unlike receipts, a template selected on an individual gift isn't used for summaries. Make sure both the English and French Giving Summary templates are selected in Settings before creating summaries.

Numbering

Summaries are numbered with the Summary Prefix from Receipt Settings (for example SUM-), separately from official receipts, so they're never confused with receipt numbers. Summaries and acknowledgments share one running counter, so summary numbers aren't always consecutive.

Delivery

A summary is a Receipt record of type "Giving Summary", with a PDF attached. It is delivered the same way as receipts, according to the donor's Receipt Delivery preference:

• Summaries for donors who prefer email (and have an email address) are "To be Emailed". Send them with Batch Receipts > Email receipts, using your receipt email template.
• All others are "To be Printed". Print them individually or merge them with Batch Receipts > Merge receipts.

The Email Setup and Donor Preferences articles explain delivery in detail.

Building the Summary Template

Giving Summary templates are built in the template editor like any receipt template; the Receipt Templates article explains the editor. For a summary:

• List each gift. Use the Insert Receipt Item Field button to add a table of gifts (date, amount and any other fields you map to Receipt Items). The row repeats for every gift in the summary.
• Show the period and totals. Useful fields include dryad__Consolidated_Receipt_Start_Date__c and dryad__Consolidated_Receipt_End_Date__c for the period, and dryad__Donation_Amount__c for the total.
• Leave out tax receipt wording. Don't title it "Official receipt for income tax purposes" or show a charity registration statement as if it were a receipt. A phrase such as "This is a summary of your giving and is not an official receipt for income tax purposes" avoids confusion.

Things to Know

• Summaries don't affect receipting. Creating a summary doesn't receipt any gift, doesn't change Receipt Status, and doesn't void existing receipts. Run your official receipting separately.
• Running it again creates new summaries. If you create summaries for the same donors and period twice, each donor gets two summaries. There is no replacement or voiding step for summaries. Unwanted ones can be deleted by a user with delete access to Receipts (the Receipt User View All permission set).
• Every received gift is listed, including gifts marked Do Not Receipt. If some gifts shouldn't appear on a donor statement, check the selection before creating summaries.
• Totals use receiptable amounts for the receipted total: advantages are deducted as for receipts. The donation total is the full amount given.

Troubleshooting

Symptom	Check
A donor didn't get a summary	Their gifts may be outside the period: summaries use the Payment Date, not the Close Date, when payments exist. Gifts must be "Closed Won" (or, when receipting by payment, "Paid"). A household gift with no primary contact has no donor to group under.
The summary has no PDF or a blank PDF	No Giving Summary template is selected for the donor's language. Check the Templates page of Settings, and the Receipting Account if you use one.
The summary looks like a tax receipt	The Giving Summary template in Settings is set to your Donation template. Select a dedicated summary template.
A donor has two summaries for the same year	Summaries were created twice for that period. Have a user with delete access to Receipts remove the extra one.
A summary wasn't emailed	The donor prefers mail, has no email address, or no email template is assigned. Check the summary's Delivery Status.