I know this topic has been discussed in length but we are a little late to the v11 game so please excuse the re-hash.
We have been running v11 on Test for a few months and have been discussing whether to transact at the household or individual level. From reading previous posts, it seems that most are transacting at the household level.
If that is the case, I would appreciate comments on how you are determining who in the household you are actually transacting with (or did you decide that the info is not that relevant?) Seems to me important info to have for contributions to know who made the actual contribution. Am I wrong?
I would like to hear what decision you made for transactions (household v individual) and what led you to that decision.
Thanks,
Todd T
Todd,
Even though you're not yet on V11, you really should look to V12 before you make your decision about where to put your transactions.
In V12 there are some cool new developments related to transactions and Constituent tracking - specifically the ability to have not just an "Owner" of a Contribution/Order but also an "Initiator", plus the ability to assign sub line items to "Recipients" in a ticket order.
Check out the What's new in V12 documenation - specifically the section near the end called "Enhanced Constituent Tracking on Transactions."
Dale
Hi Todd,
In v12 we are adding the ability to both keep the transaction on the household and track which individual in the household initiated the transaction. You can read more about it in the What’s New in v12 document in the Enhanced Constituent Tracking section. You might want to keep that coming functionality in mind as you make your decision.
Kevin Sheehan
Senior Technical Writer & Consultant
Tessitura Network
+1 888 643 5778 x 329
ksheehan@tessituranetwork.com
Hey Todd -
So just a couple of things (besides this whole v12 really exciting functionality) that swayed us towards keeping the transactions on the household:
1. Consistency: Online transactions using the old SOAP API method will force to household unless you do some fancy coding to take advantage of the REST services.
2. Ease of use: Frankly, with so many changes in v11 and getting used to the household model it was easier to know that there was a hard and fast rule that all transactions are on the household when pulling lists, reports etc. It doesn't mean that you don't have other issues, but it seemed that this helped more than it hurt.
3. Mimicked past behavior: Keeping transactions on the household was pretty much the same functionality as we had in v10, so we've been looking at v11 as our appetizer to the main meal in v12 where we'll be able to fully bite into this whole transaction enchilada. Anyone else hungry?
Not to say that there aren't perfectly valid and good reasons for NOT forcing to the household and some very successful organizations out there that aren't. It really depends on your organization and where your pain points were. Since we we've been dealing with a one-account entity for years in Tessitura, it was less of an urgent need for us to immediately have individual transaction records. Although we can't wait for v12!
Good luck!
Heather
I appreciate all the feedback. We will be discussing this issue at our user meeting later today. Sounds like most people are transacting at the household level and it is likely we will go in that direction also.
I hope you do not mind that I jump in and ask a question regarding Individual accounts within a Household. A patron made a donation under his individual log in online and we are unable to access it because we only process monies under household accounts. Is there something we can change in Tess that will allow us to access money on an individual account within a household?
Thank you in advance,
Bobbie
Hi Bobbie,
I believe you need to change your web code to use the ShiftContext web API method. This will shift the contribution (or order) to the household and vice versa when needed. So when the individual makes a contribution you will ShiftContext to the household account. The transaction will now be on the household. There are other places where we do this such as when an individual orders then goes to edit their email preferences. During the order the context is household, but when they get to the My Account page the context switches back to individual. You’ll need to talk with your web programmer, of course.
Hope that helps!
Gloria
From: Tessitura Technical Forum [mailto:forums-technical@tessituranetwork.com] On Behalf Of Bobbie Felser Sent: Monday, June 23, 2014 4:18 PM To: Gloria Ormsby Subject: Re: [Tessitura Technical Forum] Transactions-Individual vs Household take 2, 3, 4
From: Todd Tiffany <bounce-toddtiffany6582@tessituranetwork.com> Sent: 6/12/2013 12:03:41 PM
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My IT guy found this on the site for me and it worked:
To move transactions to the household:
Select the Move Transactions to Household option under the Household Operations on the Constituents menu. The Move Transactions to Household window opens:
NOTE: In order to move the ticket and subscription history you must have the ticket and subscription history screens properly configured in the custom tab table.
The number of orders and contributions moved is listed on the window: