[Spencers]

Just wondering how your organization defines Annual Fund or Annual Giving. We are trying to determine if Annual Fund is only general operating support or if other gifts over or under a certain amount should be included.

Thanks for any replies.

[n1ugu]

Annual Fund or Annual Giving is for General Operating Expenses, not restricted, not capital, not endowment. The word *Annual* just signifies that the donor either gives annually or that your organization solicits them annually. The amount of the donation really has nothing to do with putting it into an Annual Fund or not. However, most Annual Funds do have giving levels, but that's a different discussion.
Barbara

[Melissa Siobhan]

Actually - annual fund is institutionally defined and is not the same everywhere. It is often used to describe an unrestricted fund but not always. . Also, when it is used as Annual Fund I believe it typically does not have anything to do with the donor's giving annually but more to do with the funds going towards current expenses in this annual year.

Annual Giving Program or Campaign often is sometimes limited to gifts to unrestricted fund but some count any gift that is budget relieving even if restricted. It is often more a description of a goal and strategy to renew donors and bring in new annual donors.

Because of the lack of clarification with the term Annual we actually phased them completely out of our database. We use a fund called Unrestricted Current for all gifts that come in undesignated. We are currently in a 3 year campaign which will be all of our fundraising so our campaign is named after that campaign. When the campaign is over we will use a FY2010 Campaign or the like each year.

[Spencers]

Thanks Barbara and Melissa for your replies. It's been my understanding Annual Fund was unrestricted general operating funds. This however, is in question as other funds have been applied to the Annual Fund throughout the years in addition to the general operating fund. We use campaigns to define specific Annual Fund years.

I appreciate your replies and ideas.