UPDATE: Registration for our 2011 training event is now closed as we have reached maximum capacity. Materials from the meeting will be provided online after the event for those who were not able to attend this training.

Local church treasurer and finance committee training will be held on Saturday, Dec. 3, from 10 a.m.-3 p.m. at the United Methodist Building in Garner. Local church finance basics will be covered as well as updates from recent legislative changes. Local church treasurers, finance committee members and pastors are encouraged to attend. Seats are limited so registration is required. There will be a $10 registration fee charged to help offset the cost of training materials and lunch. To register, please contact the Conference Treasurer’s Office at 800-849-4433 or email Katherine Wilder.

Serving as a financial officer or in a financially related position within a local church requires that we serve with fiduciary responsibility over the financial matters of the church. This fiduciary responsibility means that we stand in service to perform our duties with the trust and confidence that we act for the benefit of the church and not for the benefit or convenience of ourselves. As we serve with these responsibilities in local churches, we are guided to provide the most effective and most efficient ways to safeguard the assets entrusted to our care. One of the ways we safeguard the assets is to put procedures in place that have been proven to minimize risks by preventing and detecting error, deterring fraud and protecting innocent staff and volunteers.

Guidelines have been developed to assist those with financial responsibilities in local churches to identify and implement basic internal control procedures. Read more »

A video of the Local Church Treasurer and Finance Committee training event that was held on December 5, 2009 is available on the Conference website in the Video Room. The handouts to follow the presentation are available in the Training Materials section of the Treasurer’s Office website. The training event covered fraud survey findings and local church minimum internal control recommendations in the first section as shown in Part 1 of the training video. The second part of the video contains stewardship best practices and questions and answers.

We are happy to offer training materials from the Local Church Treasurer and Finance Committee Training session on-line. Please visit the Training Materials page, and feel free to email our Help Desk with questions or suggestions.

An email discussion group is in place for those interested in local church finance to enable you to discuss issues facing you with your peers at other local churches. This list was requested by local church treasurers because of the need for an easy way to ask each other questions about local church policy and procedures, accounting software, auditing issues, etc. To join the discussion group, click on the following link: http://listserv.nccumc.org/mailman/listinfo/lcfinance.