[hackerspaces] Cash flow?

[Matt Joyce]

One of the arguments made for recurring payments by NYC Resistor was
specifically oriented around accounting.

Recurring payments are more easily automatically and specifically
identified as income, and thus reported properly.

Random cash arriving at random times can be very difficult to track
and report.  That is risky.

-Matt

On Mon, Feb 11, 2013 at 11:46 PM, Paul Brown <paul90brown at gmail.com> wrote:
> Paypal has an option to automatically transfer your funds out of your paypal
> account and into your bank account at the end of each day. However, they
> won't enable this unless you call them and ask for it.
>
> This prevents large amounts of money from getting caught in limbo if you get
> your account frozen (which has never happened to us).
>
>
> On Tue, Feb 12, 2013 at 1:39 AM, Paul Brown <paul90brown at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> Recurring payments are our secret weapon too. We started by using
>> recurring buttons for memberships through paypal. Now we have a checkout
>> system which also does some user provisioning.
>>
>> Since Dallas Makerspace is a 501(c)3, Paypal had the best pricing we could
>> find for our amount of transactions. They have a discounted rate of 2.2% +
>> $.30 per transaction for non-profits. If you're a 501(c)3 using paypal and
>> not getting this rate, call them!
>>
>> Paypal also has API features which we use to track payments. Every time a
>> transaction is made, Paypal alerts WHMCS that the user made a payment and
>> marks them as paid. At the end of the month, we look through the people who
>> are "overdue" and remove them from access control. If I was to start all
>> over again, I would probably use Freshbooks + Paypal. However, Freshbooks
>> looks like it will only track users who signed up through Freshbooks and
>> getting all of our existing members to sign up through freskbooks would be a
>> pain.
>>
>> If you absolutely can't stand paypal, some other (more expensive) options
>> for recurring payments are:
>> stripe.com
>> http://www.beanstream.com/
>> Google Checkout
>>
>> Side-note about payment gateways (like Authorize.net):
>> Keep in mind, if you pick a payment gateway like Authorize.net, then you
>> will also need a merchant account (which is most of the costs). For example,
>> Authorize.net has a monthly fee of $20 + a per transaction fee of $.35 and a
>> merchant account can charge a monthly fee of $10 + ~$.30 per transaction +
>> ~.5% to ~2.5% depending on the credit card. There are also setup fees for
>> both the merchant account and authorize.net. I think this option only makes
>> sense if you're getting the 200+ transactions a month that Hacker Dojo
>> probably gets.
>>
>> TL;DR: Steer clear of payment gateways unless you're huge, and use paypal
>> with some type of invoicing system to track payments.
>>
>> On Tue, Feb 12, 2013 at 12:49 AM, Arclight <arclight at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>
>>> I would agree on recurring donations. For some reason, it seems like
>>> there is always someone at every hacker space who doesn't trust Square
>>> up, hates Paypal because they rip everyone off, and insists that
>>> sporadic and hard-to-track payments that you have to chase them down
>>> to pay in person are the way to go. I'd consider charging a
>>> substantial premium for anyone who wants to pay in a non-recurring
>>> way.
>>>
>>> Arclight
>>>
>>> On Mon, Feb 11, 2013 at 10:45 PM, Casey Callendrello <c1 at caseyc.net>
>>> wrote:
>>> > There are a couple best practices we've settled on at Noisebridge
>>> > (shocking, I know):
>>> >
>>> > 1) Make it aggressively easy for people to set up *recurring*
>>> > donations.
>>> > Steer everyone and anyone towards that.
>>> > 2) Encourage sliding scale donations, for those blessed by the tech
>>> > boom
>>> > 3) Put a big piggy-bank right by the front door. But don't let it get
>>> > stolen like we did.
>>> > 4) Have a pre-written spiel describing just how important donations
>>> > are,
>>> > to be read before public events
>>> > 4.5) Break down exactly how much it costs, per day, to run the space.
>>> > Transparency in budgeting can drive home the point.
>>> > 5) Get registered as a 501(c)3 if US-based. Then some employers will do
>>> > matching donations
>>> >
>>> >
>>> > Some other spaces rent out "private" square footage for members as
>>> > needed. This works really well for Artisan's Asylum.
>>> >
>>> > HTH,
>>> > --Casey
>>> >
>>> > On 2/11/13 10:00 PM, Mark Janssen wrote:
>>> >> On Mon, Feb 11, 2013 at 9:45 PM, Tamara <Tamara at brownpapertickets.com>
>>> >> wrote:
>>> >> \> I'm seeking ideas for how to consistently cover our rent each month
>>> >> and
>>> >>> still have some funds left over for consumables, necessities and
>>> >>> perhaps a
>>> >>> small emergency fund. We currently have a scaled membership and teach
>>> >>> a
>>> >>> number of classes each month, but there's often a gap between what we
>>> >>> make
>>> >>> each month and what we need to cover it all without panic, begging,
>>> >>> and
>>> >>> general freaking out. We've begun a series of fundraising meetings to
>>> >>> discuss additional ideas for what might work, but I'm wondering -
>>> >>> what works
>>> >>> best for your hackerspace?
>>> >> Hi Tamara.  I am going to watch your conversation with great interest,
>>> >> because I don't believe there is yet a stable model for hackerspaces,
>>> >> although I do suggest a auto-paypermonth "subscription"/membership
>>> >> that some hackerspaces have employed.  Otherwise, I'm working on the
>>> >> software to make the [[[hackerspace economic system]]], that will
>>> >> allow hackerspaces to aggregate community events into a
>>> >> self-sustaining model (the focus of my research is self-organizing
>>> >> systems).  It's over at pangaia.sourceforge.net if you want to look at
>>> >> it.  Wish you luck.
>>> >>
>>> >> Cheers,
>>> >>
>>> >> Mark
>>> >> Tacoma, WA
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>>
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