The Comparison
Every row is a problem you recognize.
We built this table by interviewing 60 church administrators about what breaks. Only one column has checkmarks.
| Compliance Area | ✗ Doing It Manually | ~ Generic Nonprofit Software | ✓ Comply |
|---|---|---|---|
| Annual Filing | |||
| Form 990 / 990-EZ / 990-N selection | ✗Manually determine which form applies each year — wrong choice triggers IRS notice | ~Generates forms but no church-specific guidance | ✓ Auto-selects correct form based on gross receipts, assets, and filing history |
| Filing deadline tracking | ✗Sticky note on monitor, or you miss it | ~Generic calendar reminders only | ✓ 90-day, 30-day, and 7-day automated alerts per entity — with extension auto-filing if needed |
| Multi-campus consolidated filing | ✗Separate spreadsheets per campus, manually reconciled | Not supported | ✓ Roll-up reporting across all campuses with parent-subsidiary relationship mapping |
| Clergy Housing Allowance | |||
| Housing allowance calculation | ✗Calculated by hand in Excel — error rate averages 23% per ECFA audit data | Not supported | ✓ Auto-calculated per IRS Pub 517, flagged if designation exceeds fair rental value |
| Board resolution documentation | ✗Forgotten until audit — then scrambling for retroactive approval | Not supported | ✓ Annual resolution drafted, routed for board signature, and stored with timestamped audit trail |
| W-2 Box 14 reporting | ✗Often omitted or coded incorrectly — triggers CP2000 notices | ~Partial — no church-specific coding | ✓ Correct Box 14 designation auto-populated, synced to payroll provider |
" I used to spend the first two weeks of January in a panic. Now I open Comply and everything is already filed or queued. The housing allowance piece alone saved us from an IRS notice that would have cost $40,000 to resolve. Executive Pastor 4-campus church, 2,300 members, Nashville TN | |||
| State Charitable Solicitation | |||
| 50-state registration tracking | ✗Spreadsheet updated whenever someone remembers — usually after a cease-and-desist | Not supported | ✓ Real-time dashboard of all 50 states: registered, exempt, pending, renewal due |
| Annual renewal filings | ✗Each state has different forms, fees, and deadlines — impossible to track manually | Not supported | ✓ Auto-renews registrations 60 days before expiration, state fees auto-calculated |
| Exemption qualification analysis | ✗Unknown — most churches over-register out of fear | Not supported | ✓ Analyzes donor geography and solicitation method to identify states where you qualify for religious exemption |
" Managing compliance for 187 congregations manually was a second full-time job. Comply gave me a dashboard that shows me which churches are at risk before the deadline — not after the penalty. Denominational Treasurer 187 congregations, Assemblies district | |||
| UBIT & Special Tax Issues | |||
| Unrelated Business Income tracking | ✗Identified only at year-end, if at all — often missed entirely | ~Basic flagging only, no church context | ✓ Continuous monitoring of income streams against UBIT thresholds, with debt-financed property rules applied |
| Parking and transportation fringe | ✗Post-TCJA rules rarely applied correctly in churches | Not supported | ✓ Automatic UBIT calculation for parking facilities, transit passes per IRS Notice 2018-99 |
| Denominational Reporting | |||
| Multi-congregation roll-up | ✗CFO manually consolidates 200 spreadsheets quarterly | ~Not designed for denominational structures | ✓ Hierarchical reporting for up to 500 affiliated congregations with variance alerts |
| Compliance score per congregation | ✗No visibility until something goes wrong | Not supported | ✓ Live compliance health score per congregation — red/yellow/green status with drill-down detail |
Ready to move every row from the first two columns to the third?
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