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2:43 am
December 7, 2009
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Luke Maurits
| | Adelaide, Australia | |
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I am assuming that our primary motivation for trying to become a proper 501(c)(3) incorporated non-profit is to facilitate easier and more trustworthy fundraising. This is an important goal, but I am starting to wonder if it actually requires all the effort we have been considering so far.
Consider this page for the Union Bank of California (random bank that I know nothing about and am not trying to endorse). They state (in footnote 1) that "Service charge free checking is available to nonprofit and nonprofit unincorporated associations. Other charges, such as overdraft fees, will still apply". The emphasis on "unincorporated" is mine. I can only understand this to mean that it is possible to open a bank account in the name of a non-profit association with this bank even prior to incorporation. I don't know what sort of abilities we would have to restrict usage of money in this account, but it would mean that when people tried to donate to us via PayPal or buy something from a Cafepress store, they would see that the bank account actually belonged to CSTART rather than Rocket-to-the-moon.
Maybe we should look into this option more thoroughly. If we can get something good enough to support fundraising without going all the way through the incorporation and 501(c)(3) process, we may be able to just wait a little while until we have enough money to hire someone to take care of the scary legal stuff for us. This does mean we would have to pay the slightly increased 501(c)(3) filing charges that are coming in soon, but if I recall that increase was relatively small, as a proportion of the actual cost of filing?
What do people think?
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Starting a new TA job next week, might be busy for a while! Main CLLARE workgroups: Mission Planning, Navigation and Guidance. I do maths, physics, C, Python and Java.
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2:53 am
December 7, 2009
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Luke Maurits
| | Adelaide, Australia | |
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| posts 1127 |
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A little more on this topic: Here is a list of what one needs to open an account at Bank of America in the name of an unincorporated association (from this page):
- Business Tax ID #
- Business name filing document, such as a Fictitious Name Certificate or Certificate of Trade Name
- Organizing document, such as Articles of Association (if available)or bylaws
- Corporate Resolution identifying authorized signers if officer names are not listed on Articles of Association or bylaws
I have no idea how we get a Business Tax ID yet or if it costs anything.
The same goes for the second requirement. A Fictitious Name Certificate? That doesn't even sound real!
It looks like we may need bylaws (not sure what Articles of Association are). I'm not exactly sure what the situation is with bylaws for an uninforporated association and whether or not we could create newer, better bylaws when we actually incorporate later.
It looks like we may be able to readily control spending by requiring more than one authorised signers to sign cheques? If, say, Rocket and brmj were both authorised signers, one would have to post a signed cheque to the other before it could be useful, which means fraudulant use could only occur if they were both in on it, which is hopefully unlikely.
We will have to look more into what is involved in getting the things above and what they cost to determine if this really is a more cost effective option for now.
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Starting a new TA job next week, might be busy for a while! Main CLLARE workgroups: Mission Planning, Navigation and Guidance. I do maths, physics, C, Python and Java.
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3:55 am
December 7, 2009
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brmj
| | Rochester, New York, United States | |
| Member | posts 365 |
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Honestly, I think this is the wrong way to go about things and that we should instead try and incorperate, then collect the rest of our $500 or so and get 501(c)(3) status, then open the bank acount. It would be a hassle to have to switch accounts when our status changes, and I suspect that there is a difference between an "unincorporated association" in the legal sense and an organization that simply hasn't bothered to incorperate yet. Anyway, $500 shouldn't be all that hard to get, hopefully.
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Main work groups: Propulsion (booster), Spacecraft Engineering, Computer Systems, Navigation and Guidance (software)
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4:50 am
December 7, 2009
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Luke Maurits
| | Adelaide, Australia | |
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| posts 1127 |
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Fair enough, just thought I'd throw this idea out there and see what people thought.
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Starting a new TA job next week, might be busy for a while! Main CLLARE workgroups: Mission Planning, Navigation and Guidance. I do maths, physics, C, Python and Java.
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5:52 am
December 7, 2009
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Rizwan
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I agree with brmj, we should incorporate first and then get a bank account. Who knows what legal problems might come up if we try to sidestep.
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