Hello and welcome to today's orientation on Chapter Officers Fiscal Responsibility. IAFN developed this presentation and has no conflicts of interest. You can receive a certificate of attendance with nursing education contact hours for this activity after completing the evaluation. Over the year, your chapter will face a lot of very routine financial experiences. You might also face some experiences that are new to you or rare for most chapters. IAFN is here to support you through all of those circumstances. Many situations can be navigated or managed with support. As the treasurer, in particular, your main contacts will be myself, Christina Presenti, the HR and finance coordinator, and Stacey Robertson, the finance director here at IAFN. So I'm the main contact for chapters and should be the first person you communicate with for most things. I'm also the person presenting today. Just email me and I'll get you to the right person or people if somebody else needs to get involved with your question. Stacey, the finance director, will review and approve contracts and expenses over $1,000 in coordination with our events planner, Pam. Stacey will also be auditing your accounts in PNC and managing any challenges or requests related to the audit. These are some immediate steps that need to take place. So anytime there's a transition of the treasurer, this has to take place, but it could also be during the year if a treasurer needs to step down or you have to have a special election for any reason. If you're watching this at the start of the year, these items must be completed by the end of February. By completed, that means the items must be done by the end of February. So make sure that any of these items are initiated, meaning the debit card is in the mail on February 1st. That way your chapter is in compliance with those deadlines, especially if there's delay in mail or something gets caught up. In order for the incoming treasurer to receive their debit card, the outgoing treasurer has to send their debit card to IAFN by mail using a tracking number. The treasurer should notify me that the debit card is in the mail. That way we can be on the lookout to follow up with the chapter. Simultaneously, the incoming treasurer needs to send the last four digits of their social security number to me in order to register for their debit card. That debit card is in no way attached to the credit of the treasurer. Those are just a means of registration. The incoming treasurer will also need to sign a bank affiliation agreement that outlines specific responsibilities associated with the debit card. Get those tests done as soon as possible so your chapter has the ability to make payments. We really want to support you, not have any interruptions at the beginning of the year. So let's move into talking about chapter goals related to your fiscal responsibility. When we talk about chapter goals, I'm thinking about this at the 5,000-foot level. What are your big picture goals? So the chapter's main purpose is to provide education. So that is always a component of any other goal. In relation to a chapter's financial goals, your main goal is accurate management of funds. I think about that in terms of ethical, transparent accountability and management. So in context of those two goals, I really want to talk a little bit about how great most of our chapters are at being stewards of funds, meaning that a lot of the chapters are good savers. But maybe saving isn't always the answer that helps you achieve your main goal, which is education. So in the case of the chapters, it is your members' expectations that you will be providing a service, specifically education. So if you as a chapter need to spend money in order to provide education or increase access to education, spend the money. If you have it in your account, obviously don't overdraft or anything like that, but really think about the way to best provide the service of education to your chapter. And if you do need to have expenses associated with that, that is absolutely okay. So the takeaway from this slide really is that accountability and spending funds on the chapter's purpose, which is education, and accurately, transparently managing those funds. So now I want to talk a little bit at the 1,000 foot level, what this kind of looks like, the implementation of those goals. I'm going to think about that as a strategy of the chapter. So depending on your chapter and how much funds you do have, you may make five or 50 decisions related to finance throughout the year. So at the beginning of the year, it's really important that all of the chapter officers need to be really clear on how your chapter makes financial decisions and what the main purpose of the chapter is. What is important that each officer understand that process, who will be involved or notified, and how the treasurer will report out on their actions and tasks. That follow-up is an important piece of the accountability. So a tip is for chapters to discuss their financial goals and strategy at an early chapter meeting so all chapters are aware of the current chapter finances, the expected income throughout the year, and goals around saving or spending. If the chapter officers are all on board with the overall strategy for the chapter finances, every decision throughout the year about expenses will be easier as all of the officers have a foundation of understanding. So now we are going to be moving into microscopic nitty gritty. So the process or specific tasks of how to achieve your strategy and your goals around your fiscal responsibility. So these individual tasks largely fall to the treasurer. These are the tasks outlined in their role. But it is the responsibility of all chapter officers to follow up and ensure these tasks are completed. The tasks that we will discuss moving forward will help the chapter achieve their goals and maintain accountability now and in the future. Everything we do builds towards accurate record-keeping and reporting. So I'm going to talk into describing two practical tools that I will refer to throughout the rest of the conversation. So I want you to be familiar with them as we keep moving forward. So on this slide, what you are looking at is a preview of the reimbursement tool provided by us. So this is a three-page tool with IAFN's reimbursement policies. This document has been approved through a lot of our federal funders and it's something that we use all the time. So your chapter is welcome to update or adapt this form to the needs of your chapter. So some of you might be asking why is this form important? So whenever the chapter is providing a reimbursement, a record with receipt of all expenses must be kept by the chapter for seven years, again, seven years, that number changes from time to time, but in general it's around that, in case of an IRS audit. So the IRS is one of the stakeholders for the chapter and we do have specific things that have to be done for the IRS. So as a treasurer, you know, this year you're the incoming treasurer, if your previous treasurers have been doing their job and having accountability in the finances, if you are audited, well, you are the treasurer, which I hope doesn't happen to you, but if you are audited, you should have all the documentation you need in order to pass and sail through that audit with success. So while you're a treasurer, you're really providing documentation for the future treasurers and really the future longevity of the chapter. So again, this reimbursement tool is very important because it asks for all of the information that would enable the chapter to sail through an audit. So when would a chapter use this form? This form is used anytime the chapter is providing payment to someone, that could be a presenter, an officer or a member for something that they have provided or won. So this is something that maybe they've already paid for. So for example, this form would be used if the chapter was reimbursing a presenter for meals and mileage, this becomes a record of what meals they purchased and how far they drove. This form would also be used if a chapter officer purchased lunch for an in-person training. This form would be used if a member won a scholarship to a conference or another educational offering that that member had already paid for, and the chapter wants to reimburse them that cost. So these forms are not needed if a chapter is providing payment for expenses directly. If the chapter hires myself to come in and do a training, and you are providing payment for that, there would be a contract. And in that contract, it would outline what you would be paying me. That is a direct payment that doesn't involve this form. A tip, when you're thinking about this form, is that your chapter should accept this with copies of receipts for any expenses incurred. So those receipts are proof of expenses, without those receipts, there should be no reimbursement by the chapter. And that is outlined on the form, but just a tip here as well. Next, I want to show you the quarterly dues report. This is a very important report to become familiar with. So the way that this report works, wait, first I want to stop, and it's probably obvious, but you will have actually true names and email addresses and actual information about people in this form. The way this form works is that IAAFN collects chapter dues on behalf of the chapter. So the dues come directly to National, and then we disperse it to the chapters. So each quarter, we provide a written report to the chapters of everyone who has paid dues the previous three months, and we also deposit whatever that total amount is into your chapter bank account. So this is what that quarterly dues report looks like. This is our record to you of the funds that you are owed. So this report is posted in the chapter officer community, and it's accessible to all chapter officers. So this is an example of what that will look like. As chapters recruit more members, their total income quarterly will increase, enabling them to provide more education to more forensic nurses. As a chapter that is planning for trainings or expenses this year, you can look at past reports to see what you may or may not be making. Those numbers tend to remain consistent as long as the chapter continues to provide services people typically will renew with the chapter when they renew with IAFN. So the nitty gritty treasure tasks related to this form, the treasurer are responsible for ensuring the total in this report matches the total that is deposited into the chapter bank account. Often chapters will also use this report as a means to reach out to new members they haven't connected with yet. So when the treasurer double checks this information, the bank account, I want to say 99 percent of the time it's accurate. But if there is a problem, we want to know as soon as possible, because that is typically the easiest way to fix a concern. So the next thing I want to talk about is the actual banking piece. So all chapters have IAFN issued bank accounts at PNC Bank chapters will do most of their banking online or with their debit card. PNC does not have local brick and mortar banks everywhere in the country, although you can visit their website for locations. The treasurer, unless someone else is designated by the chapter, will be provided a unique log in to PNC's online banking. And that is where most of the treasurer's duties will be will take place. So treasurers are not issued a checkbook, so there's no checkbook, but they will be able to write checks through PNC's online banking. So some things that are important to know about PNC, there are no cash advances associated with this account, so it should be very hard to overdraft your account. It should not be a goal, but it shouldn't be able to happen. There is one debit card issued for each chapter, the chapter cannot make purchases on credit and can only spend what is in the account. The PNC account and the PNC debit card are not tied to the treasurer's credit. Again, there's no credit with this account that does help make sure that chapters are only able to spend what they have. And Stacey Robertson, if you remember, we saw her picture earlier, is the main account holder for all chapters, and Stacey will audit the chapter bank accounts from time to time. The goal of these audits is not punitive in any way, but it is to ensure that proper documentation is taking place. So Stacey might go in and she might see that you reimbursed three chapter officers. She might ask, hey, did you use the form, either our form or another form? Do you have copies of the receipts? And there's a couple of reasons that Stacey does that. One is that knowing what happened is an important part of the annual report for treasurers. And again, we talked about the IRS audit. So Stacey's asking you that question in May or something that happened in March. You're much more likely to be able to find or have access to that documentation than you would be if we're not asking you about it until December. So that really, again, it's not punitive, but it's really to try and help with those reminders about the accountability pieces. So here are some tips for successful treasurers. So I'd really recommend treasurers, if you set an alert on your phone now, so you make it a habit to sign into the PNC bank account at least once a month. I mentioned that because, again, the sooner we identify an issue, if one comes up, the better able we are to respond to that situation. If there is an expense on your account that you didn't make, we want to know about that right away. The chapter must keep track of all receipts. So that's either if you purchase something on a debit card, that receipt needs to get saved. Again, that would be part of the IRS audit. A good practice is to take a photo with your phone, email them to yourself and add them to the chapter financial folder for safekeeping. Every chapter has their own record of their own system of record keeping. So discuss what your chapter is doing so you have the same system year to year or you know where that information is if you need it, if you're the incoming treasurer. But if you get in the habit of making a purchase, taking a photo of that receipt and emailing it to yourself, you will have a record of that receipt for longevity. I know for myself, sometimes if you put it in a purse, it is gone by the time you get home. So that is just a good tip for making sure that you have what you need when you need it and you continue to maintain that accountability. Another reason I recommend logging in one time a month is that if you have not logged into your bank account, or if there is no activity for three months in your account, and I think deposits are not included in that, your account will become inactive. So PNC will actually send us a notice if your account is inactive, and they do that on all checking accounts. So if we get a notice that your chapter is inactive, it's a flag for us that your chapter might not be meeting the minimum requirements in its affiliation agreement. We will reach out to you if that happens. Most treasurers will log in to verify the balance for a treasurer's report at annual meetings. That's actually another great tip. I think I talk about it later, but I'll mention it now, is that most chapters on their agenda have a report out by the treasurer that talks about, you know, what's your bank account balance? What happened last month? Did we pay anybody? Did we have any income? What does that look like? And some of those are very short, but they are very important, again, because it is all of the chapter officer's responsibility to know what is going on with the chapter finances. We are going to talk about chapter income next. At this point, you know the main goal of the chapter is to provide education, and you also know that IRS is a stakeholder with specific rules the chapter needs to follow. Chapters need to track what type of income they're receiving. If the chapter receives any income that is not specifically related to education, the chapter does need to report that differently to the IRS come January. If the chapter does not report that income correctly, chapters can lose their tax-exempt status. So that's pretty important to know. So throughout the year, the treasurer does need to track that information. You know, how are you getting income? How much is it? And again, this is another, if you're doing this monthly or if you're updating things quarterly, that really helps you by the time you get to the end of the year. So two ways that IAFN support chapters to maintain compliance with the IRS. The first is Stacy will audit your bank accounts from time to time, and she'll ask questions. Again, those questions are not punitive. Those questions are really to help make sure that you are prepared to meet these expectations. The second way is through the annual renewal documents. Those documents provide a way for the chapters to communicate with IAFN. So IAFN can do kind of a mini-review of that information, again, to ensure that you're in compliance. It is much easier to compile the information that is necessary the closer that you are to the event when it occurred than waiting for years. So the main way that chapters make money is through member dues. Member dues are $30 a year, but they can be prorated. So a member can join any time throughout the year, and we will prorate those dues. So when the treasurer is looking at your chapter quarterly dues report, you might see $30, you might see $120, you might see $90. If a chapter member is paying for more than one year, you're going to see bigger numbers. If they're paying a prorated amount, you will see smaller numbers. So a couple things to know about chapter dues. 100% of those dues go directly to the chapter. IAFN does not keep any percentage of that. An IAFN member is not required to be a member of a chapter. It is optional, and that is a great area of membership for you to recruit from. To be a chapter member, you must be a member in the International Association of Forensic Nurses. Chapters can provide discounts on chapter membership. That's just important to know if your chapter decides they want to do a specific recruiting event in March, or they want to change their chapter member dues associated with their conference, your chapter can vote on it. You do need to let me know because I'm typically the one making the invoice for your chapter dues for your chapter members. Another way that chapters make income is through conferences. I'm going to cover this very briefly today because there is another orientation that is amazing, and that one actually includes examples and equations on how to determine cost, income, and registration fees. There are also accompanying documents with that presentation, and if your chapter is planning a conference, I'd really encourage you to watch those. You will certainly pick up new information anytime that you watch something like that. The quick overview on conference income is that it's up to each individual chapter if you will even charge for your conference or not. Some chapters do charge a registration fee, and that might be in order to cover expenses with the goal of breaking even. Other chapters will charge a registration fee, and their goal is to make money in order to offer other educational offerings. Some chapters do not charge a registration fee, and their goal is to break even or to cover all the expenses right out of their account. Other chapters offer scholarships for individuals who travel, so if the chapter wants to offer scholarships, they can do that. If they want to offer specific scholarships to increase access to the education, that is another option. Other chapters charge a member or non-member rate for the registration fee, and that can be a really great recruitment tool for non-members who see a discount or see value in becoming a chapter member. Chapters can also accept donations. The donations can be a donation in kind, such as they're being donated food for a specific chapter event. They can also be donations in money, monetary value. The one thing to know if somebody does provide a donation in a monetary value to your chapter, the IAFN chapter donations are not deductible as a charitable contribution for the donor. Another way chapters can make money is through raffles, with the caveat that raffles are not legal in every area and every state, so please check your local laws to make sure that if you do plan on holding a raffle where money is being exchanged, you are compliant with whatever your local laws are. So quickly, I want to talk about the nitty-gritty of income collection. So a lot of chapters ask how they can accept payment, and there's a couple different ways that your chapter can accept payment. The first thing I'm going to address is one that is not recommended. Some chapters do accept cash, and that is, again, it is not recommended, it is hard to track, and the accountability is tricky. If your chapter does need to accept cash for any reason, make sure that that is being put into the PNC account as soon as possible. Make sure that a receipt is provided to the member as soon as possible, and a copy of that receipt is being kept with the chapter. But in general, avoid that as much as possible, particularly where we do not have PNC brick-and-mortar banks all over the country, and particularly where most of our members are doing an incredible amount of things. Getting to the banks to do the deposits or manage cash is just really an unreasonable thing to kind of have chapter officers doing. So the other ways that chapters can accept payment, it can be in a check, and there's two, there's three ways actually to deposit those checks. First is if you have a brick-and-mortar PNC, you can deposit it there. The second is that you do have access to a mobile app if you would like to deposit checks. The third is that you can mail them to the International Association of Forensic Nurses. So you would take a picture of the checks before you send them, you would mail them with tracking, and you would let us know that we're coming. That way we can notify you very quickly, you know, that we've received them, or if there's a challenge, we're all on top of that very quickly. With checks, it is important to know that checks are set to be voided at different dates. So some of them are voided after 30, some of them are voided after 90, and some of them are voided after 120. So it is important, if that is how you are collecting any funds, that you are very timely in depositing those to ensure that the checks are not bounced. The longer you wait, your ability to be accountable with those resources kind of drops, as well as the likelihood of that check bouncing increases. So chapters can also accept payments into third-party collectors. Again, this is rare, and technology is always changing, so I will not be listing specific providers here. Anytime that a chapter needs to set up a third-party collection service, typically for a conference, it should be time limited. At the end of that collection period, the chapters, the chapter officer should review a statement that shows a zero balance in that account, and should review that all of those funds have been transferred to the PNC bank account, and that account can be closed. It is important anytime that a chapter is using a third-party or collector, as well, that the funds are transferred to the chapter weekly. So get into that habit. If that is something that the chapter does choose to do, those funds should be moved to the PNC account weekly, or as soon as possible. So I do want to talk about how chapters collect dues. Most chapters follow a very simple process where they will send me an email if a member needs an invoice for their chapter dues, and then the chapter has no additional tasks or responsibilities related to that member's chapter dues. If you are an incoming chapter officer, particularly a treasurer, I want you to think about the steps involved in collecting your own dues, and think about that this is something that is reasonable for you. In 2019, the majority of chapters did vote as a board to no longer collect their own dues. So most chapters are not engaged in this process, so this is a slide that most of you will not have to listen to. The reason that most chapters moved away from this, and the reason I really encourage that most chapters move away from collecting their own dues, is because it is a process. It really involves timely steps, and if we don't do everything in a timely manner, the chapter might not get the dues that are owed to it, or the member might never show up on your chapter roster. So the steps that I'm talking about involve, you actually need a mechanism for a collection, so that might be receiving a check from somebody else. The treasurer would have to have a mechanism to track, you know, where is that check to deposit the payments. For some of you, this might be easier than others, and then you're also following up with IAFN to notify us of any payments received within a week of receiving those payments. And so once I receive that notification from you, I can update the member profile, and they'll appear on your chapter roster. If I never get that email from you, they look like they're not a chapter member on your chapter roster, and that can create complications with chapter members. So a tip here is that if your chapter is collecting dues, take copies of all the checks that are deposited, or mail to IAFN if that is what you choose to do. And same process as we discussed, you email that to yourself, and then you save it with the chapter financial information. So even though these tasks really fall with the treasurer, it is the responsibility of all board members to check in with each other and with the treasurer to ensure that all steps are completed in a timely manner. This could be a standing item on an agenda. It is really important that all board members know where things are in the process, you know, are the funds received, are the funds deposited, or are the funds still in somebody's purse. So the other option for chapters, and this is really a service that IAFN provides to chapters, is that IAFN can collect your dues for you. So if your chapter does not collect dues directly, when an individual wants to join IAFN, or the chapter, or if they want to confirm their membership dates, all they need to do is send a check to IAFN, and they will collect your dues. Membership dates, all they need to do is send a simple email to the individual member and cc me, membership at forensicnurses.org. I will create a unique invoice for that member that wants to join. Dues are then paid to the chapter in that quarterly report. There's a couple different ways that you have accountability into that process. This is a really simple process. It's a lease time involvement for individual officers and ensures that all the nitty-gritty details are checked and completed. So funds are collected directly, there's a specific record of the transaction, member profiles are updated immediately, and funds are deposited to the chapter. This is by far the simplest, least time-consuming, highest level of accountability way for the chapters to handle chapter dues. So we're going to move into talking about chapter expenses now that we have completed all the different ways that your chapter can have income. So by this point you all know the main goal of the chapter is to provide education, and it follows that all chapter officer decisions about expenses in some way will relate to that goal. It is a good time to remind you, without encouraging waste, that it is absolutely okay and expected that the chapter have expenses related to education. As a chapter, you are encouraged to think of creative ways to utilize your funds to expand educational opportunities. For example, a chapter might choose to provide travel reimbursement in a very rural state for the statewide conference. Chapters might set up a sim lab for chapter members to encourage competency and review of skills where they are needed most. Chapter expenses will vary by chapter as individual circumstances and opportunities vary. So now let's move in to some of the details. Chapter expenses. Chapters that elect to hold conferences, either virtual or in person, may have various expenses associated with those trainings. Very similar to trainings, conferences can have a variety of the same or similar expenses, possibly with the addition of food, rooms, and other services, depending on the venue. Again, I'll refer you to the specific officer orientation on conference planning that has a lot of hints that has a lot of hints and tips for conference planning. Another expense for chapters will be a presenter or contractor. If your chapter is hiring a presenter or contractor, the chapter does need quite a bit of information. And this is an instance where multiple chapter board members might work together to achieve these goals. The amount of information required increases depending on the cost of the presenter. If your chapter is paying a presenter over $650, not including meals and travel, they must complete a W-9 for the chapter prior to their presentation. This is huge, because chasing a presenter down months after a presentation might be a real challenge. And as a treasurer, why do you need this information? If you are paying a presenter in January, or you're paying them $800 to do a training, they have to fill out that W-9, because in January of the following year, you need to provide them a 1099 income form for their taxes. So again, the IRS really dictates this process, but that W-9 is really important. They like to think about it as part of completing the CE paperwork, if you're going to be providing CE. When you're setting all that up, you ask them for their bio, their credentials, get them to fill out that W-9 as part of the CE paperwork or establishing the contract. Another chapter expense could be scholarships. Each chapter is empowered to make their own decision about if they want to provide scholarships, what provide to who, and the monetary value of those scholarships. If your chapter does decide to provide scholarships, the chapter needs a policy. It needs to be fair, it needs to be transparent, and it needs to be able to be applied across the board. The scholarship policy must conform with the chapter affiliation agreement, the bylaws, and the fiscal policy. If your chapter is providing a scholarship, there are some pricing norms related to travel. Those can be found at gsa.gov. So if your chapter does want to provide a scholarship, for example, to Advocacy Day in Washington DC, that's a free training that IAFN sponsors, but we do not provide funds or reimbursement for travel. So the chapter can choose to do that, and a lot of chapters support their chapter members going to that training. If you were trying to figure out how much you should reimburse or provide a scholarship for, or how much that will cost the chapter, that is a great website that will give you specific costs of meals, of mileage for all over the United States. So that is a great resource. Next, I want to talk about a couple of different tips. So these are kind of big picture tips. Anytime that your chapter is in relationship over an exchange with a presenter, a venue, whomever, you should have a contract in place, and there should be a receipt. And those are really important, because particularly with folks that we know or organizations that we work with on a routine basis, we can have sort of expectations set. But the contracts really outline who's responsible for what. They make transparent what, if anything, will happen with information that's exchanged. They do provide provisions for accountability as well, particularly if expectations are different than reality for whatever reason. So the chapter should really get in the habit of having contracts. Pricing norms. I just mentioned this on the last slide, but there are pricing norms for venues, for hiring presenters, for travel. And so we encourage you, if you are not doing this every day, if you have questions about room blocks or anything, really, please call us. And we do have staff members who work on contracts all the time who coordinate with hotels all the time. So they have really good expertise in those specific areas, and we want to make sure that you are not being overcharged or taking advantage of in any contract that you're working on with somebody. Any expense over $1,000 must be reviewed and approved by the International Association of Forensic Nurses. So even though we have to approve contracts over $1,000, if you have a contract that's less than that that you want us to review, let us know. Again, that's another service that we'll provide to you. And then the last thing I wanted to say is if you are looking for presenters, please reach out to us. We do have IAFN staff members who provide trainings on a regular basis to chapters. Kathleen McGuire, who has a great presentation on scene certification, is a favorite among chapters, and she frequently will attend a chapter meeting to do that. Great. So we're going to switch gears and talk about the annual report. This is something that, as an incoming treasurer, you will be responsible for completing in January of the following year. I'm talking about it here as part of your orientation because, one, I want to take away the myth that this is really challenging things to do. And two, I want to prepare you for the things that you will be responsible to do so you can plan ahead proactively. So we're going to dive in. Most of these are due by the end of January or February in the following year. So your chapter financial form. This is typically filled out by the treasurer, and it is a final accounting of the year by the treasurer, and it's a report to IAFN. So I was talking about earlier one of the mechanisms by which the chapter talks to IAFN, and IAFN audits the chapter to make sure that they're in compliance to the IRS. That's this form. So we're going to go over this form and make sure that if there's anything that your chapter needs to report differently than normal to the IRS, we know what that is, and we can help you do that. So this form could take about a half an hour to an hour to complete if the treasurer is keeping accurate records throughout the year. Some treasurers do need to go through the bank statements or the bank account from January through December at the end of the year. But one way to alleviate some of that is to review and update this form quarterly. So if it's January of the new year, and you're an incoming treasurer, download this form. And every time you get that chapter dues report, look at your past three months of any income, any expenses, and update the form. If you make it a habit of doing this, it will be a very short task at the end of the year, and you'll be really familiar with it by the time you get there. And again, this should only take a couple of minutes. Some chapters have just a couple of transactions for the year, while other chapters have more. But again, there's not a whole lot of income and expenses, but this should be a pretty quick task. So the information that's required is your income from all your membership dues, your any other income that the chapter has earned, any expenses that the chapter has, and any bank account balances. This form is an IRS form. It's the 10990. And this is not required of all chapters. This will only be required of chapters that pay somebody, like a presenter, over $650 any time throughout the year. So this is why we ask presenters for the W-9. If you have a presenter's W-9, you will have all of the information that you need to fill out this form in January. If you do not have that W-9, it makes it really challenging for you to fill out this form, and now you have to contact the presenter. It's a real hassle. So it's really important to follow the steps throughout the year to really minimize your time at the end of the year around completing this report. And again, when you do fill out this form, it's a pretty simple form. You'll include how much you paid that individual, and you'll provide this form to the individual at the beginning of the following year. The other form that is an IRS requirement is the E-990. And this is a form that is not required of all chapters. This is the E-990. Every chapter will fill out this form. So this is typically filled out if your revenue is under $25,000, and most chapters do fall into that category. So this really takes about 10 minutes. I know I keep saying that, but I promise you this is a very quick task. We will send you reminders, and we'll help provide the information that you need if you don't already have it. So the E-990 requires three pieces of information. The first is the chapter's unique EIN number. So that is a social security number for a business. So your chapter has one, and it is unique to your specific chapter. If you don't have this, check with your previous officers or reach out to IAFN. We will be able to provide that to you. You also want to know how much your total income was for the previous year. It is not the total amount that you have in your bank account, but it is the amount of money that came in over the previous year. The third thing, and this is probably the trickiest part, is your username and password. Your chapter should have this. If your chapter doesn't have it, please reach out to IAFN. We might have helped file this form the previous year, so we might have that information. If you don't have it, we can set up a new username and password, but it really does help to have continuity year to year. And again, this form, typically like this to be done by the end of January. The final tip related to the E-990 is that the chapters must use the IAFN Home Office address as the chapter address on this document. So that's really the conclusion of what pieces of information the chapter treasurer is typically responsible for in your annual report. And so you can see how kind of keeping up with your responsibilities throughout the year might help reduce the amount of time at the end of the year and make these tasks very manageable. So I really want to talk very quickly about some big picture takeaways before we close today. So all of the chapter accounts are located at PNC. The chief finance officer at IAFN, that's Stacy, will be the primary signer on all of the chapter accounts. The chapter treasurer is the secondary signer on your specific chapter account. Any bills that the chapter has can be paid via PNC's online bill pay. The treasurer will be given a debit card. That is not a credit card. There is no credit issued to the treasurer. There is no credit associated with the PNC account. So there really is no credit that the chapter can access. IAFN will audit your accounts. So don't be surprised if you have questions. Again, those questions are intended to be supportive of the chapter to make sure the chapter is compliant. Those are not intended to be punitive in any way. Really, we work together to make sure that we have the information that we need. So PNC shuts down accounts that have three months of inactivity. So it really is your responsibility as a treasurer to be checking that account on a somewhat regular basis. I recommend monthly. If monthly doesn't work for you, definitely recommend quarterly. And think about that quarterly dues report as an opportunity or an invitation to go double check the account to complete your annual report. Update everything as you go along. It's going to really help you manage things a lot easier as a treasurer. And the final thing, I know I've said it a lot, but we really do mean it, is that IAFN is here to support chapters. So contact us any time with questions. Again, we know that in these roles that you have as chapter officers, regardless of whether it's treasurer or something else, these might not be your primary jobs. But there are people at IAFN who are happy to support you with particular items that they do as their primary job every day. So before we close, I just want to review the goals of the chapter. So I know you know by now, but the chapter's main purpose is to provide education. So that's always a component of any other goal. In relation to finance, the chapter's main goal is accurate management of funds. So this is a good time to mention that a lot of chapter officers are good stewards of chapter funds. But today, we've gone over that sometimes the best way to reach the goal, which is education, is to spend the funds. You know, being thoughtful about the way that those funds are distributed in order to increase education or access to education is a critical component of accurate management. But really, it's your job to make sure that you're delivering on education to your chapter members. So the last thing that we're going to go over today is that every chapter officer is Every chapter officer is accountable to a variety of stakeholders. That includes your members. That includes the chapter itself as an entity, as the business that it is, to the IAFN, and to the IARS. So the treasurer's unique role relates to the tasks associated with managing and reporting on chapter funds in a transparent and accountable way, but every officer is accountable for those responsibilities. So as many leaders in the long history of the chapter and the chapter treasurer's management of funds and the consequences for management or mismanagement, we really implore you to take that responsibility to heart as you move into this role. Because what you do throughout your term, whether it's a year or two years, could really have consequences for the chapter moving forward. So think about the stakeholders that you have and think about those responsibilities that you have as you take on this role. We really are very excited that you have stepped up into this role. And so I really want to say thank you. I think it is an awesome responsibility that you're taking on to become a chapter officer. And that's great. We're really excited about it. So this presentation doesn't cover every single aspect of financial management or every situation your individual chapter might face. But I do hope that this overview is helpful to you. I really hope that you walk away remembering a couple of things related to this orientation and mostly that we have a wealth of resources to support your chapter and to support you in your role. So please reach out anytime you have a question or if you need support. And again, I really just want to say thank you so much for all you do in general as a forensic nurse. But also thank you for taking on this additional responsibility and stepping up into a leadership role. You can contact me anytime at membership at forensicnurses.org. And I'm really looking forward to working with you this year.

Chapter Officers Fiscal Responsibility

accurate management of chapter funds

transparency in reporting

education expenses prioritization

treasurer contacts

contracts and expenses approval

audits and challenges management

income collection methods

expense categories