What Ian Fincher Thinks New Orleans Nonprofits Need to Know About Accounting

Ian Fincher

Ian Fincher's nonprofit clients are doing good work. A youth mentorship program in the Seventh Ward. A legal aid clinic in Orleans Parish.

A food bank serving three neighborhoods.

What they're not doing is staying on top of accounting. And that's where Ian Fincher comes in.

Nonprofit accounting is genuinely different from business accounting. You're managing donor restrictions, tracking grants, proving compliance with government regulations, and convincing auditors that your money is being used for mission, not administration.

Most nonprofit directors don't have training in this. They're experts in their mission, not their books. Ian Fincher fills that gap.

Why nonprofit accounting is different, and harder

A for-profit restaurant owner cares about one thing: is the business profitable? A nonprofit director cares about multiple things at once.

Is money from donors being used for the program they restricted it to? Yes? Good.

No? You've violated the donor's intent. That's a compliance issue.

Are you tracking salary expenses separately from program expenses? Most auditors require you to. That means your accounting system has to split every salary across different categories based on what percentage of time that person spends on mission work versus administration.

Do you have a government grant? Then you need to prove you spent the grant money only on what the grant covered. You need separate accounting for grant funds.

You need documentation for every single expense.

Ian Fincher works with nonprofits across the spectrum. Small volunteer-run organizations. Larger nonprofits with staff and budgets in the hundreds of thousands.

Every single one has the same basic challenge: proving to government agencies, donors, and auditors that the money is being used correctly.

The single audit that catches everyone off guard

Here's what Ian Fincher recommends nonprofits know early: if you receive more than $750,000 in federal funding in a year, you're subject to a Single Audit Act audit.

Most nonprofit directors have never heard of this. Until the phone rings and the auditor is asking for documentation they don't have.

A Single Audit isn't just an audit of your financial statements. It's an audit of your compliance with every grant requirement. It's complex, expensive, and it's mandatory.

Ian Fincher tells nonprofit directors this early so they can prepare. You need to track grant spending separately. You need to document that you complied with each grant's requirements.

You need to have tested controls in place.

This doesn't happen by accident. It requires actual accounting infrastructure.

Fund accounting isn't optional

Most nonprofit accounting systems use fund accounting. This is not standard business accounting.

Instead of one checking account and one profit-and-loss statement, you have multiple funds. General operating fund. Restricted donations fund.

Grant fund. Endowment fund.

Each fund is treated as a separate mini-organization. Money in one fund can't freely transfer to another without violating donor intent or grant requirements.

Ian Fincher sets up fund accounting systems so that when a donation comes in restricted for a specific program, it automatically routes to that fund. When the grant money arrives, it goes to the grant fund. When you spend money on programs, it comes from the appropriate fund.

Without this, you're guaranteed to have compliance problems during an audit.

Document your mission, not just your money

Here's what Ian Fincher emphasizes to nonprofits that most accountants don't: your job is to document your mission alongside your money.

When the auditor asks "how do you know this salary expense is actually program-related?" you need to answer. Is the person a program director? Do they spend 80 percent of their time on program work?

You need evidence.

Keep timesheets. Keep program attendance logs. Keep documentation of what your programs actually do and who they serve.

Ian Fincher reviews financial statements and then asks: would an independent observer believe this organization is using money for its stated mission? If the answer is no, the audit will flag it.

Nonprofits in New Orleans do essential work. Youth programs. Legal services.

Food assistance. Community development. Ian Fincher wants them focused on that work, not scrambling to explain their numbers to auditors later.