Sahaja Yoga Australia
 
National

New improvements to the management of Sahaja Yoga Finances

Jai Shri Mataji!

Dear Yogis,

Sahaja Yoga continues to grow both as a collective and in serving the needs of seekers wishing to explore Sahaja Yoga. As a collective, we have undertaken a number of large undertakings and major Projects such as those in Brisbane, Adelaide and at  Balmoral. The National Easter Seminar each year is growing and growing, going from strength attracting visitors from all around the world. This means the scale of the services that we need to provide to cater for the demands to host a safe and credible event are also ever increasing.

(Photo: Easter Puja 2018 Balmoral)

Review by our Auditors

Life Eternal Trust Australia (LETA) recently commissioned a review by our Auditors of our finances and the controls, checks and balances and oversight processes that are in place. This is to ensure that Sahaja Yoga finances in Australia continue to be managed as best in breed for a not-for-profit Australian Charity registered body.

As a result of their review, the Auditors have made several recommendations of our finance and underlying  functions. The Trustees of LETA have agreed to implement all their recommendations and will be implementing the following improvements to the management of collective funds:

 Auditors’ Recommendations:
  1. Change the current Software accounting program.
  2. The separation of functions and team that are responsible for the  Receipting of donations from the Team managing Payments.
  3. Appropriate training and support for Finance teams.
  4. Streamline the processes for payments and receipts, so that they  are more use friendly.
How LETA will implement the Recommendations:
  1. LETA is investing in the adoption of the XERO accounting program and will train finance team’s in the use the new package.
  2. The separation of the Receipting and the Donations functions will take place from the 1st of July 2018.
  3. The Revenue Team, under Radhika Richardson and the team, will look after all Cash, Cheques, Direct Debits or any other Donations . The team will provide receipts accordingly.
  4. The Disbursements Team, under Judy Lenartas and team, will manage all payments and reimbursements only.  Please email copies of Invoices of expenditures to the Team on [email protected] or post invoices to LETA P. O. Box 154, Burwood NSW 2134.  The team will issue cheque payments.  To claim reimbursement, all Invoices being claimed must be made out to “Life Eternal Trust Australia”. This allows us to claim back the GST made on payments.
  5. The Finance Team will also be trialling a new user friendly Receipting and Payments options.

If you have any suggestions / concerns regarding improvements then please don’t hesitate to contact the Finance team at [email protected]

Sincerely,
Andre, Lyn and Trustees for LETA