Review a payout
How payouts are grouped, what each tie-out badge means, and how a payout report or email ties one out.
A payout is one deposit into your bank account. Planning Center pays out online gifts by card and bank (ACH) in groups, and cash and check gifts arrive as batches. After each nightly sync, the Review page lists every payout Constat found, with a status and a tie-out badge. These steps are for churches on Planning Center Giving and QuickBooks Online. For another giving platform or ledger, write to [email protected].
How payouts are grouped
Constat groups your online gifts into payouts from Planning Center’s processing dates and the usual time card and bank payments take to settle. A committed cash and check batch is its own record: its total is the sum of its gifts. Payout timing in Settings, Sync adjusts the settlement days; change it only if payouts keep landing on other days.
The tie-out badges
- Tied: the payout matches a payout report, a payout email or the bank amount to the penny.
- Tied (Residual): it matches, and the deposit also holds income that isn’t from Giving, such as registrations.
- Needs Payout Report: grouped from processing dates and not checked yet.
- Variance: the evidence disagrees with the payout. The detail lists possible causes.
The status badge says where the payout is: Held (waiting for review), Ready (approved), Posted, Posting failed, Skipped, or Deleted in QuickBooks. The Needs you filter shows the payouts waiting on a person.
Payouts that need a payout report
A payout marked Needs Payout Report can be checked two ways.
- Compare it with your bank statement. An approver clicks Approve with the bank amount and enters the deposit amount from the statement. It must match the payout to the cent.
- Upload Planning Center’s payout report. In Planning Center Giving, open Account settings, Payments, Payouts, choose the month’s dates and export the payout report. Drop the file on the Review page. One report a month ties every payout in it.
Reviewers, approvers and owners can upload. The Review page takes CSV, XLSX, PDF, text and email (.eml) files up to 25 MB each.
Forward payout emails instead
Each church has its own payout email address, shown on the Payout reports setup step and in Settings, Sync under Payout emails. Forward Planning Center’s payout emails there, or set up a rule that does it. In Gmail, add the address under Settings, Forwarding; Gmail emails us a confirmation code, which appears in Constat shortly. Then add a filter that forwards mail from Planning Center. In Outlook, add a rule that forwards mail from Planning Center to the address. Add the address you forward from under Forwarding from, or the mail is not accepted.
In the payout detail
Open a payout to see its tie-out, its lines by fund, the evidence it was checked against and what is in QuickBooks. You can set a deposit date when the money reached the bank on a different day, leave a note for the next person, put it on Hold, or Skip a payout that should never post. Next: Approve and post a payout.