The use of computers for religious activity has become common with time; today different types of church management software are used for administration in churches. This usually involves software that would maintain a database of the members, donors, financial transactions, events to be conducted and a lot more. They are not only an efficient way to store and perform sophisticated functions on the data but also a quick way to get reports in form of graphs.

Once you purchase software, you may find difficulties handling it, especially if you are not a computer literate. So the question is – What you need to do for handling the software you purchased in an efficient manner and how will you receive the support you need?

Here is something that will answer the above question.

Free Support

• Free support and maintenance are provided by most of the charity management software.
• The customer support services are provided by the technical expert through email, calls, chats, and letters.
• The website from where you have purchased software for your church may also have webinars, video tutorials, etc. to give a practical demo of how to utilize the church software. The free support is limited for a period of usually three months. The software providers deliver introduction guide which contains start-up instructions. In small software where minimum operations are performed, it is enough for understanding the working of the software.
• Some of the software providers also offer manuals having in-depth details of every aspect that may be in pdf or physical form.
• The treasurers, secretaries, and administrators are assisted through an online forum where they can hold one to one conversations with the experts regarding the financial, accounting, gift aid, etc. functionalities of charity management software.

Paid Support

Once your free support trail is expired you will have to pay for the support and maintenance which can either be a monthly or yearly contract or a pay per service.

1. Contract Basis – It is a cheaper way of dealing as you have to pay a fixed amount monthly or yearly. This is the best option if you are dealing with huge database and your church has multitasking software used by a number of users. This type of service is based on volumes of operations that you may not be able to perform simultaneously. When you need an assistant for a long span of time, let’s say for hours, signing a contract is appropriate.
2. Pay Per Service- The software vendor will charge you for every call or email assistance offered. It is usually the case when you need some technical support for an issue that is rare to occur. Such services cost according to the response time i.e. if you need immediate assistance, you have to pay more whereas when you wait for your turn which can be anytime in the whole day, the service is cheap.

Training

The vendors also give training for using their church software and charity management system that may be available remotely or through physical interaction. Training sessions are conducted for one to four hours depending on the need of the trainee. The training typically is given in areas such as finance, donation and gift aid, membership, etc. according to the software. The classes are performed using laptop or desktop. The courses undertaken make the trainee perfect for handling software they are performing the duty of financial coordinator, donation coordinator, membership coordinator, treasurer etc.

The church management software package has revolutionized the process of administration in the church. They reduce the error made during the manual handling and also the database is not just in one hand, it is accessible to everyone in the community.