Getting Help

Received Funds & Deposits

Log the checks and cash your group collects, then batch them into a bank deposit that books itself and prints a two-signature cash verification form.

What Received Funds Is For

Money doesn’t arrive at your group in neat, single amounts. It arrives as a shoebox of checks from the membership table, an envelope of cash from the bake sale, and a check somebody handed the principal last Tuesday. Eventually all of it goes to the bank in one trip — and the bank records one deposit, not thirty.

Received Funds is where you log each item as it comes in, and then batch those items into the deposit you actually take to the bank. BeeKeeper writes the journal entry for you and produces a Cash Verification Form — the counting sheet with two signature lines that most PTA bylaws require.

The two-step shape is the whole point:

Step What happens in your books
1. Receive each check or cash item Nothing yet — the item sits in a pending list
2. Deposit the batch One journal entry: bank account up by the deposit total, income accounts credited item by item

Because the entry is created at deposit time, your books show a single deposit for the exact amount your bank shows — which is what makes reconciliation work.

Finding Received Funds

  1. Go to Bookkeeping > Banking
  2. Click the account the money will be deposited into (your checking account, for example)
  3. Click the Received Funds tab

The tab appears on any balance sheet account, so you can also use it for a savings account or a petty cash account.

The page shows your Pending count and Pending Total at the top, then every item waiting to be deposited.

Recording an Item

Click Receive Funds and fill in the form.

Field Notes
Payment Type Check or Cash
Date The date you received it, not the date you’ll deposit it
Amount The amount of the individual check or cash item
Check The check number. Required for checks, hidden for cash
Received From Who gave it to you — a family name, a business, “Bake sale — Mrs. Ruiz’s class”
Email Address Optional. Enter one and BeeKeeper emails that person a receipt
Purpose Only appears if your organization has membership tracking turned on — see Collecting Membership Dues
Income Account Which income account this money belongs to
Memo Anything you want to remember later

Click Save and the item joins the pending list.

Enter items one at a time as they arrive, or sit down with the whole shoebox and enter them in one session — either way works.

Emailed Receipts

If you enter an email address, BeeKeeper sends that person a receipt showing who it was received from, the amount, the date, the memo, and the check number. It’s a nice touch for donations, and it’s proof of payment for anyone who asks.

The receipt goes out once, when you first save the item. Editing the item afterward does not send an updated receipt, and adding an email address to an item you already saved won’t trigger one either. If you need to correct a receipt someone already got, delete the item and re-enter it.

One Item, One Income Account

Each received fund goes to a single income account. If one check covers two different things — say $50 for a membership and $30 for spirit wear — record it as two items so each amount lands in the right account. They’ll still deposit together in the same batch.

Changing or Removing a Pending Item

Click any row in the pending list to edit it, or use the ⋮ menu on the right to edit or delete.

Pending items are completely yours to fix — nothing has hit your books yet. Once an item is part of a deposit, it locks: BeeKeeper won’t let you edit or delete it, because the journal entry has already been written. Review the list before you deposit.

Creating a Deposit

When you’re ready to take the money to the bank, click Create Deposit.

  1. Set the Deposit Date — the date the money goes to the bank
  2. Check off the items going in this deposit. Select All grabs everything; Deselect All clears it
  3. Watch the running Cash Total, Check Total, and Grand Total on the right as you select
  4. Confirm the Grand Total matches what you’re physically taking to the bank
  5. Click Create Deposit

Checks and cash are listed in separate sections so you can count each stack against the screen.

You don’t have to deposit everything at once. Select just the items in this trip and leave the rest pending for next time.

What BeeKeeper Creates

Submitting the deposit does three things:

  • Writes one journal entry dated your deposit date, with a payee of “Deposit” and a description like Deposit: 12 checks, 3 cash items. Your bank account is debited for the grand total, and each income account is credited for its share — amounts to the same account are combined onto one line
  • Attaches a Cash Verification Form PDF to that journal entry
  • Marks the selected items as deposited, removing them from the pending list

You’ll land on the deposit detail page showing everything that went in.

The Cash Verification Form

The attached PDF is the counting sheet. It includes:

  • Your organization name, the deposit date, and the deposit account
  • Every check, listed by check number and amount, with a check total
  • The cash total
  • A grand total
  • Breakdown by Account — how the deposit splits across your income accounts
  • FOR OFFICIAL USE ONLY with two signature and date lines

Most PTA and booster club bylaws require two people to count money together. Print the form, have both counters sign it, and file it with your treasurer’s records. Download it any time from the deposit detail page with Download PDF — it’s also attached to the journal entry itself.

Viewing Past Deposits

Click View Deposits on the Received Funds page for a list of every deposit made from this account, newest first, with date, description, and amount.

Click any deposit to see the items that made it up and to download its Cash Verification Form.

How Deposits Reconcile

This is where the two-step workflow pays off. Your bank statement shows one line: DEPOSIT $1,842.50. Your books show one journal entry: Deposit: 12 checks, 3 cash items — $1,842.50. They match, and the deposit clears in one click during reconciliation.

If your account has a bank connection, the deposit will also show up in your bank feed a day or two later. Don’t accept it as a new transaction — that would record the same money twice. Match it to the deposit entry BeeKeeper already created. See Imported Transactions for how matching works.

A Caution About Deposit Entries

The journal entry BeeKeeper creates is an ordinary journal entry, which means someone with access can edit, void, or delete it from the account’s transaction list.

Deleting or voiding it does not send the items back to the pending list — they stay marked as deposited, but the deposit disappears from your Deposits list. Leave deposit entries alone. If a deposit was genuinely wrong, void the entry and record the correction as a normal journal entry rather than trying to redo it through Received Funds.

Best Practices

  • Log items as they arrive. A check sitting in a drawer with no record is how money goes missing from the books
  • Count with two people and both sign the form. It protects your volunteers as much as your organization
  • Deposit in batches that match your bank trips. One deposit in BeeKeeper should equal one deposit slip
  • Check the Grand Total against your deposit slip before submitting — it’s much easier to fix a pending list than a posted entry
  • Use Received From consistently. “Smith Family” beats “check from a parent” when you’re looking something up in March

Common Questions

Does recording a received fund change my account balance? No. Nothing posts to your books until you create the deposit. That’s deliberate — the money isn’t in the bank yet, so your books shouldn’t say it is.

Can I edit an item after it’s been deposited? No. Deposited items are locked because their journal entry already exists. Review the pending list before depositing.

Can I use this for money that never touches a deposit slip — like a card payment or an online donation? It’s built for physical checks and cash. Electronic money that lands in your bank directly is better handled through your bank feed or, for FutureFund sales, FutureFund Payouts.

One check covers two different fundraisers. What do I do? Record it as two received funds, one per income account, each with the same check number. They’ll deposit together and the check total will still be right.

Do I have to email a receipt? No, the email field is optional. Leave it blank and no receipt is sent.

Someone’s receipt had a typo. Can I resend it? Not directly. Receipts send once, at the moment you save the item. If it’s still pending, delete it and re-enter it with the correct information to trigger a new receipt.

Can I deposit into savings instead of checking? Yes. Received Funds is available on any balance sheet account — open the account you’re depositing into and use its Received Funds tab.

What if I deposited cash and checks together but the bank split them into two deposits? Create two deposits in BeeKeeper to match, selecting the cash items in one and the checks in the other. Your books should mirror what your bank actually recorded.

Why doesn’t my deposit show a Purpose or Membership option? Membership tracking is off until an admin sets a Membership Income Account in Settings > Update Settings > Memberships. See Collecting Membership Dues.

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