How can it be set so the local time is used for donations. The way it is now when a person donates at 9:15pm PST it gets dated the next day because the server is located in EST. This is critical for donors at year end especially when they make donations during THIS tax year but your system records it as happening in the NEXT tax year.
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I am really struggling with this same issue. Our BBMS reports are the only ones in my entire working life that are in US date format vs. my NZ date format. We also run into problems with the date on receipts for our donors. It's a big deal for us.
We had this exact issue on December 31st this year as well. A donor gave at 10:02 MST and BBMS recorded the donation at 12:02 EST on January 1, 2020. We need to get this issue fixed so that we can receipt donors correctly for tax purposes.
We use Online Express with the receipts being created online at the time of donation with the transactions being processed through BBMS. Actually, I just looked at one of the receipts and the date is showing up based on the donor date/time, so the tax receipt date doesn't appear to be an issue. It is only the BBMS data stamping EST for disbursements etc so it's not as big of an issue as I thought.
Unfortunately I'll need a bit more information. Blackbaud Merchant Services itself doesn't issue any tax receipts. Most Blackbaud applications, that the constituent would directly utilize, issue receipts and they traditionally operate in the time zone set in their settings. For instance, if you use Blackbaud NetCommunity and your product is set for the Pacific time zone, your donor would be receipted in that time zone. The BBMS transaction time won't matter.
So, ADMIN, are you saying that if a donor resides in Vancouver, BC, or in LA, Ca, which are in the PST zone, makes a donation @ 9:15pm PST on December 31, 2018 the tax receipt the system automatically generates will say December 31, 2018 or will it say January 1, 2019? I could be wrong but it seems to me the CRA (in Canada) and the IRS (in the USA) will only consider the donation for the 2018 tax year if the date on the receipt says the donation was in 2018... BBMS I believe will incorrectly stamp 2019 on the receipt.
Hi Grant! Thanks for the suggestion. When acknowledging the gift for the donor's tax purposes it isn't relevant what the processing engine time is displayed in. They're eligible to be receipted because they made the transaction in time for the local time zone cutoff of the nonprofit. Blackbaud Merchant Services doesn't change any part of the receipting or acknowledgement journey.
When looking at overall accounting your BBMS account is a clearing account until disbursement. The disbursement process is moving money from the clearing account to your operating account. Thus the disbursement portion of the journey is also after the acknowledgement or recognition of revenue.
All of this said, we are considering multiple time zone views for the future in the BBMS Client Portal. Thanks again for reaching out!