Some organizations may need to make changes to their endowment fund information in bulk within Balance due to an institutional change of accounts, or a conversion to a new General Ledger system.  Depending upon the level of customization in your Balance database, there may be a significant amount of work involved in making sure the data changes flow properly through all of your reports, imports, exports, and customized functionality.  

 

Note:  Fund information is attached to ENDOWMENT KEYS on the back end, so changes to GLIDs will not impact fund history or transaction history. 

 

What to expect?
Clients will typically email our Support team when they first find out that they are going to be converting to a new General Ledger system.  At that point, the client will start looking into what updates will be needed to their Balance database.  Sometimes, this can occur 1-2 years in advance of their ‘go-live’ date.  This is perfect!  We like having these projects on our radar!  However, there is no rush to let us know if you are still working through the details and are not quite sure what changes will need to be made.  We will be here when you are ready! Rest assured, we have done many General Ledger Conversions! 

 

Process:

When the initial request comes in, you will be asked to complete a short questionnaire.  This will give you an idea of what potential changes you would need to make in Balance.  This also gives us an idea of the scope of the project.  One of our programmers must do a comprehensive analysis of your database to ensure that there aren’t any customizations that would be impacted by the updates requested on the questionnaire.  

  • If the only update needed is to the GLID, then you can make all other updates via our Bulk Import tool, and no meetings are required; this project will be free of charge.  
  • If you will need to have meetings and/or other updates, this project then becomes billable.
  • We can give you an estimated cost for the project based upon the questionnaire.  We will not require a signed Statement Of Work (SOW) until closer to the project’s start date.


General Ledger Conversions typically have a 6 to 8-week turnaround time on our end (depending on other projects in our queue).  If we determine that this project may take longer, then we will notify you as to when to reach back out to us to start the process. 


If you have any questions leading up to your General Ledger Conversion, please email our Support team and reference “General Ledger Conversion” in the subject line.  This will automatically send the support ticket to our Special Projects team who handles these requests.  We will answer your questions and then close out the tickets for you.  


Approximately 2 months prior to your ‘go-live’ date, you should reach back out to Support to start the process:

  1. We will have you review the original questionnaire again to make sure that it is updated to reflect any recent changes. 
  2. We will review the original estimated cost and questionnaire again to provide you with a quote and Statement of Work (SOW) to be signed.  This will officially kick off the project.
  3. We will create a test database once the signed SOW is returned. 
  4. You will make any necessary adjustments in the test database to update fields via Bulk Import tool (Destination ID, new GLID in an empty field if available, other fields as required).  We will guide you through this process as needed.
  5. Our programmers will make all other updates that you are not able to do (GLID, exports, etc.).
  6. You will review & approve the test database changes.  
  7. Once your conversion happens, we will move the data over to your production database.  
  8. 10 days after we make the changes to your production database, we will close out the project and submit the invoice.


Initial GL Conversion Cost

A 10-hour minimum charge will include: 

  • Analysis of your Balance database and any current customizations, imports, exports, and reports that may be impacted
  • 1 hour of meeting/consulting time with one of our Balance experts
  • Creation of a test environment and set up of your user accounts
  • Update of GLIDs in your Balance database
  • Updates to distribution rules based upon changes to Destination IDs

 

STANDARD RATE: $225/hour

RUSH RATE: $255/hour

 

Items that Can Be Handled By The Client

Some updates may be completed in your Balance database, such as: 

  • Changes to Fund Profile fields other than GLID, such as Destination IDs (using the Bulk Import tool)
  • Changes to User-Defined Reports that are needed due to these changes (example: filtering on specific GLIDs will need to be changed to reflect the new GLIDs)

 

Additional Possible Charges

We charge $225/hour ($255/hour for RUSH) for consulting and programming services.  General Ledger Conversion items that could incur additional charges include:

  • Changes to any fields other than GLIDs in your database
  • Changes to imports and/or exports based upon account/GL changes
  • Changes to custom reports based upon account/GL changes
  • Changes to customized processing in your database based upon account/GL changes
  • Updates to reports based upon account/GL changes
  • Any changes that you are able to do within Balance, but choose to have us complete on your behalf
  • Any other work outside of the scope of what is outlined in the initial General Ledger Conversion estimate


Statement of Work

A Statement of Work (SOW) - a contract between Evertrue (Fundriver's parent company) and the client outlining the scope of work and cost estimate for the project - will need to be fully executed prior to the project kick-off.  The SOW will include the initial 10-hours plus any additional hours deemed necessary during the assessment.

 

Please contact Fundriver Support at support@fundriver.com if you have any questions about the General Ledger Conversion process, or if you want to start your organization's conversion project.