Introduction

CharityEngine offers contact management for households - allow you to easily and quickly create households and associate members within the household. Householding allows users to monitor and manage engagement of donors within the household. The feature will also allow you to easily see direct contributions of the household while also having quick access to donations made by all members of the household contributed at the individual level. 

Prerequisites

1. Note: Households are considered contact records and will be considered as an additional contact count for your database. Contacts include people, organizations, and households. 
2. Business Decisions and Governance for Households
   1. It is important to note that your organization will need to determine the appropriate assignment of donations for households and associated members of a household.
   2. It is not necessary to create a soft credit of an individual/member donation to the household record as long as the member is connected to the household. Doing say will result in an inflated donation value for the household record. 
   3. Through CharityEngine functionality, donations made by a member of a household will be rolled into the total household contributions (as available on the $ Donation History panel - Member column) or by leveraging query fields such as Contact: Giving History - Current Year Amount (direct household contributions) & Affiliated Giving History - Current Year Amount (member contributions). 

Instructions - How to Create a Household

Step 1: Navigate to the Contacts App > Quick Action > New Household

Step 2: Add household Name (required)

1. From the General tab, also set status, priority, solicitor, Head of Household (select an existing or new person contact record), use Copy Address to leverage the Head of Household address on file, add Spouse, add the household address (if override not used above for head of household), add household phone number, and contact preferences. 
2. From the Groups, Tags, List tab, assign groups, tags, and/or communication Opt In Lists
3. From the Communications tab establish communication and acknowledgment preferences
4. From the Source tab, assign initiative or response channel for contact creation
5. From the Sync tab, use for external ids if needed for importing from an external database

Instructions - How to Assign an Existing Person Record to a Household

Step 1: Navigate to the Contacts App > Organizations & People > Contacts > locate household record > ACTIONS > Manage > Edit

Or: click on add Head or add spouse

Step 2: Click on Head and/or Spouse hyper link to initiate contact lookup wizard and locate and assign contact to the household > SAVE to secure your changes

Instructions - How to Assign a New Person Record to a Household

Step 1: Navigate to the Contacts App > Organizations & People > Contacts > locate household record > ACTIONS > Manage > Add > Members

Step 2: You will be navigated to create the contact.



Step 3: You can select the place within the household the member holds such as Head, Spouse, or Other.



Step 4: Once the new household member is created, you will be able to see the new member and the household they are attached to.



Step 5: You will also be able to see the household member on the Household contact record.

Instructions - Managing Transactions for Households and Their Members

When leveraging households, your organization will need to create business rules to determine if or how donations are attributed to households. If an individual of household makes a financial donation, it is not necessary to create a soft credit to the household as CharityEngine will automatically calculate giving totals for all members of the household. Creating a soft credit to the household will duplicate total household giving dollars, incorrectly inflating total household giving. 

In this example, in 2023 The Williamson Household has:

1. $180.00 in direct/hard credits made directly by The Williamson Household
2. $17,135 in donations made by members of the household - this value represents direct/hard credits made by any member of the household
3. $17,315 in total donations including direct/hard credits of the household and donations made by members of the household

By navigation to the Transactions panel of the contact record, users will be able to see all direct and indirect donations. The use of the house icon will distinguish direct contributions made by the household. While the person icon will identify donations and financial contributions made directly by any member of the household. 

Instructions - Managing Members of Household

By navigating to the Members panel, users can quickly identify all members within a household. Head of Household and/or Spouse will also be identified as the top of the household contact record. 

To remove members, navigate to ACTIONS > Manage. You will be navigated to the person contact record. Next select Edit (top right hand corner) >Household > Delete to remove from the household 

Instructions - Reports & Analytics for Household Reporting

Leveraging the Reports & Analytics App, many reports will incorporate People, Organizations, and Household. In this example, the Top Donors report provides person contact Mary Williamson as a top donor month to date. In addition, The Williamson Household is reported as a top donor of $180 associated with 1 transaction. Within the Affiliated columns, a user can quickly see attributed donations of $12,010 which are associated within the household as made by directly by a donor(s)/contact(s) associated with this household. 

FAQs & Additional Materials

Q. When an individual of a household makes a donation, do I need to create a soft credit to the household?
A. No. CharityEngine's householding functionality will automatically track financial giving actions of any associated household members. The total household giving can be located within the Donation History of the Household Contact Record. From this view, a user will be able to see Direct contributions of the household (hard credits of the household) vs. Members (donations made as hard credits by individual contacts who are members of the household). Creating a soft credit to the household will duplicate total household giving dollars, incorrectly inflating total household giving. See more detail above in the section title Instructions - Managing Transactions for Households and Their Members

Q. How do I de-dup household contact records?
A. Learn more about household de-dup functionality in our article Workflow & Automation: Data Governance – Contact Management (Merge, Delete, Inactive)

Q. How do I create organizational and/or people contact records?
A. Learn more about creating Organizations in our article Contacts: How to Create and Manage Organization Contact Records.Learn more about creating People contacts in our article Contacts: How to Create and Manage People Contact Records

• Contacts
• Contacts: Updating Donor Passwords (Legacy)
• Contacts: Creating a New Person Contact from an Organization Record
• Contacts: How to Create a New Affiliate/Chapters (Legacy)
• Contacts: Managing Contact Status Types and Priority
• Contacts: How to Easily Bulk Update Contacts (Groups, Solicitors, Activities, Opt Ins, etc.)
• Sending Email Campaigns from the Contact Listing Screen
• CharityEngine Best Practices for Employees and Volunteers Who Leave an Organization
• Workflow & Automation: Data Governance – Contact Management (Merge, Delete, Inactive)
• Configuration: How to Configure for a Fiscal Year and Downstream Reporting (Legacy)
• Contact Records: Creating Custom Field Groups and Custom Fields
• API Configuration: How to Configure your WealthEngine API Key
• Data Governance: Updating Contact Records Through the Transaction or Contact Screen
• Mapping Data to Imports- How to Confirm Opportunity Dates are Imported Correctly and Update Them
• Online: User Center Configuration (Legacy)
• Communication: How to Send Messages from Listing Screens
• Contact Records: Changing Contact Type (Legacy)
• Contact App: How to Add (and Delete) a Solicitor to a Contact Record
• Contact Management: Contacts Who Are Online Now
• Memberships: How to Create & Manage a New Member - A Comprehensive Guide
• Memberships: How to Manage Existing Membership Records
• Contacts: How to Create and Manage Activities (Legacy)
• Contact Records: Addresses
• Contact Emails
• Contacts: How to Add Badges to a Contact Record
• Contacts: How to Identify and Use the Outlook & Constituent Ranking
• Printing the Contact Summary Page
• Configuring Salutations
• Adding Seasonal Address
• Contact Record Page
• Contacts - Editing Contact Record Panels
• Contact : Notes
• Contacts: Quick Actions
• Contacts/Transactions : Quick Filter - My Preferences
• Contacts: Comprehensive Guide for Usage and Management of Tributes
• Opportunities & Moves Management: Comprehensive Guide for Set Up, Configuration & Reporting(Legacy)
• Contacts : Files
• Data Importing: How to Import Contact - Organization Data
• Data Importing: How to Import Contact - Household Data
• Contacts: Adding Contacts to Your Basket for Exporting
• Contacts: A Guide to the CharityEngine Projects Feature
• Contacts: Relationships & Connections
• Queries: What Can I Do with Queries - Creating A Comm List including People, Households, Orgs
• Reports & Analytics: How to Use the Constituent Density Report
• Contacts: How to Create and Manage People Contact Records
• Contacts: How To Set Your User Preferences
• People: People, Households, & Organizations Search
• Online: Online Constituent Portal Configuration
• People: Creating & Adding Tags or Groups
• Data Importing: How to Import Contact - People Data
• Data Importing: Contacts & Use of Contact Matching
• Workflow & Automation: Data Governance – Contact Management (Merge, Delete, Inactive)
• Sending Tracked Emails
• Contacts: How to Create and Manage Organization Contact Records
• Contacts: How to Create and Manage People Contact Records
• Contacts: How to Create, Use and Manage Cases
• Contacts: Updating Donor Passwords
• Memberships: How to Create a Membership Type (Configuration)
• Configuration: How to Configure for a Fiscal Year and Downstream Reporting
• Contacts: How to Create a New Affiliate/Chapters
• Contacts : Deleting Contacts in Bulk