The Finance team manages the processing and recording of donations to LSE and payments for alumni events. We also provide financial stewardship to donors and administrative and academic departments across the School, and, in addition, process and monitor all office expenditure within LSE Advancement.
Donations processing
We manage the receipt of all money into LSE Advancement, ensuring that it is recorded and banked correctly. LSE Advancement receives donations and event registrations through a number of channels: online, by post and over the phone. We accept payment by cheque, credit card, direct debit, bank transfer, charity voucher and gifts of stock.
We also manage the Gift Aid process, ensuring that HMRC requirements are met.
LSE Advancement works with a number of overseas trusts and the American Fund for LSE and LSE Foundation, ensuring that donations received by the office via these routes are correctly recorded and allocated in the database.
Working with the Research Division we ensure that philanthropic research grants are accurately recorded, and that these are reflected in the School’s philanthropic giving totals.
Annual Fund
We ensure that all donations to the Annual Fund have been correctly recorded. We then allocate the funds received to the Annual Fund account before arranging transfer of funds to all successful Annual Fund applications.
Major gifts
We deal with every stage of major gift processing: recording pledges on our database, Advance; setting up new gift allocations, which detail the intentions of gifts; requesting new accounts; setting up payment schedules; invoicing for payments; entering payments, claiming Gift Aid where appropriate; and allocating money to the correct accounts.
Financial Stewardship
Donors – we provide financial information to donors, including a detailed giving history and reports on how donations have been spent. We also advise on payment methods and monitor late payments, as well as issuing reminders and invoices.
Recipients – we work with departments and centres to ensure that money is spent according to donors’ intentions. We work particularly closely with the Financial Support Office, to set up new scholarships and monitor scholarship accounts.
LSE Advancement – we provide financial information to all teams in the office. We also advise on financial stewardship and ensure policy compliance in proposals and gift agreements.
Legal and procedural – we work with the Finance Division on donations accounting, providing a monthly reconciliation of our Campaign Account and monitoring donation accounts held within the School.
We also liaise with solicitors to arrange the payment of bequests to LSE and ensure that legators’ wishes are fulfilled.
Office expenditure
We process invoices and expenses for LSE Advancement, ensuring compliance with LSE financial regulations. We also provide budget reports for LSE Advancement teams.