Simply Giving

With Simply Giving, your contributions are made through a pre-authorized withdrawal from your bank account. You determine the frequency of your automatic contribution – weekly (on Monday), semi-monthly (1st and 15th) or monthly (1st or 15th) – the option is yours. Your contribution is deposited into the Thanksgiving account on the same day it is withdrawn from your account.

Benefits to you and to the church

Simply Giving is a reliable, safe way to move your stewardship plan into action. It allows you to share your contributions through planned giving and activates your generosity into ongoing stewardship. Because your contribution is given consistently, you won’t need to play “catch-up” at year-end or worry about forgotten checkbooks or missed Sunday offerings. But you’re not the only one that benefits. Thanksgiving benefits from steady, more predictable revenue throughout the year, more efficient bookkeeping, and greater confidence in meeting its financial commitments.

Thanksgiving members started using Simply Giving in 1999, and over 110 families are now using Simply Giving.

New enrollments and updates can be made online or using a paper form.
Enrollments and Updates using a paper form: Print and complete an enrollment/update form and return it to the church office or place it in the offering plate. Enrollment/update forms are also available at the Welcome Center.

Enrollments and Updates online:
In addition to setting up automatic donation plans, members can make their own changes and view their own donation histories. One-time donations can also be made online.

If you are an existing Simply Giving member you may access your account after your email address has been added to your Simply Giving record by the church. The church office has been working to get emails collected and entered. After the email address has been entered you should:
1. Select the “Give Now” button at the top of this page – this will bring up a secure page
2. Click on “Create a Profile” under “New Member” and use your email address. It should recognize your email address and email you a temporary password. Please contact the church office if it does not recognize your email address to verify what email address is in the record — please do not create another profile.
3. After receiving the temporary password, select the “Give Now” button again on this page.
4. Enter your email address and your temporary password in the “Returning Member” box.
5. It will ask you to change your password (remember what you change it to) and then it should display your account.
6. In the future you should use the “Returning Member” box to access your account.

If you are enrolling as a new Simply Giving member for the first time you should:
1. Select the “Give Now” button at the top of this page – this will bring up a secure page
2. Click on “Create a Profile” under “New Member” and use your email address.

Additional notes:
Please select “Monday” (and not “Friday) if you give weekly to help consolidate processing for entry into the church data base.
To donate semi-monthly, add a donation for monthly on the 1st and add a second donation for monthly on the 15th.
Select the transfer date to be a Monday (for weekly) and the 1st and/or 15th for monthly or semi-monthly donations.
The transfer date is adjusted automatically to not display on a bank holiday or weekend for checking accounts.
The transfer date does not adjust to a banking day for credit cards.
If you edit a donation that has an adjusted date you need to enter the “non adjusted” date or the program displays an alert stating the date is invalid.
For example, if you donate on the 1st of the month but the 1st is a Saturday the transaction date would be displayed for the 3rd (unless that Monday happened to be a bank holiday then it would say the 4th). If you edited the amount for such a record you would also need to reset the date using the 1st.
If you have problems editing a donation that delete the donation and add a new one.
Changes from checking accounts must be entered before 3:00 PM two business days prior to the donation date.
Selecting the “Summary” tab in your record will display your scheduled donations.

Whom do I contact if I have more questions about Simply Giving?

Please contact Harold Carlson at 402-292-2695 or harold.carlson@thanksgiving.church if you have questions.

Simply Giving is administered by Vanco Services, LLC, a vendor that Thrivent Financial for Lutherans has contracted to provide administrative services since 1998.