Compliance
The paperwork the law expects — produced by the system, not by you at 11pm.
A church in South Africa is a legal entity with real obligations: to SARS, to the people whose information it holds, and to anyone it employs. This page sets out what is required and exactly what My Church Experience does about each one — so you can send this link to your treasurer, your board or your auditor and let it answer for itself.
Section 18A donation certificates
Income Tax Act, section 18A
An approved public benefit organisation may issue a receipt that lets the donor claim the donation against their own tax. The certificate has to carry the right details, and the donation behind it has to be traceable in your books.
What MCE does
- ▪ Certificates are generated from giving already recorded — not re-typed, so the receipt and the ledger cannot disagree.
- ▪ Eligibility is set per income category, so ordinary giving and qualifying donations stay properly separated.
- ▪ Donors who are not part of your congregation are recorded as External Donors: they receive certificates but are kept out of attendance, follow-up and member counts.
- ▪ Donations received as goods rather than cash are tracked in and out, with a stock reconciliation.
Records that survive an audit
PBO record-keeping and financial statements
Cash is the hardest money to account for, and it is most of what a church receives. The question an auditor asks is not "what did you bank" but "who counted it, who confirmed it, and can you show me".
What MCE does
- ▪ Every cash collection is counted on screen, signed by three people, and printed with that sign-off repeated on every page — so no page can circulate without its authorisation.
- ▪ A committed collection cannot be quietly edited. Corrections are made as audited amendments that record what changed.
- ▪ Cash counted, cash banked and the ledger are reconciled against each other, and a mismatch is corrected rather than hidden.
- ▪ Income & Expenditure and Balance Sheet are produced from your own financial years and opening balances, not a fixed template.
- ▪ Transfers between your own accounts are recorded as neither income nor expenditure, so your figures are not inflated by moving your own money.
Members' personal information
Protection of Personal Information Act (POPIA)
A church register holds names, contact details, dates of birth, sometimes ID numbers and giving history. POPIA treats that as personal information the church is responsible for.
What MCE does
- ▪ Each church's records are separated at database level. The separation is enforced by the database itself, not only by our software, so it holds even if a mistake is ever made in the code.
- ▪ No church can see another church's information. Nothing is pooled, combined or compared across churches.
- ▪ Inside a church, access is by role: who may see giving, who may see contact details, and who may see nothing beyond their own ministry.
- ▪ Changes to records are written to an audit trail, so it is answerable who changed what.
Said plainly: as the people who operate the platform we do have technical access to the database, exactly as every software provider does. We do not access your church's records except when you ask us for help with a problem. Any provider who tells you they cannot reach your data is not being straight with you.
Staff you employ
Basic Conditions of Employment Act
A church with employees carries the same obligations as any employer: hours worked, overtime, Sundays, public holidays and leave, recorded properly.
What MCE does
- ▪ Staff clock in and out from their own personal QR code, with a location check — not a shared code anyone can use on someone else's behalf.
- ▪ Hours are classified the way the Act does: normal time, overtime, Sunday and public holiday.
- ▪ Leave is recorded against standard South African leave codes.
- ▪ The result is a payroll-hours report you can hand to whoever does your payroll.
Staff Attendance for Payroll is a paid add-on. It produces the hours; it does not calculate PAYE, UIF or SDL.
Built here, for here
Section 18A, POPIA, PBO record-keeping and the BCEA are South African requirements. International church software is not built around them, and generally cannot produce a certificate SARS will accept — because it was never asked to.
My Church Experience is priced in rands, billed in rands, and built inside a working South African congregation. There is no exchange rate between you and your church management system, and no annual surprise when the rand moves.
Forty-five days, no card required.
This page describes what the software does. It is not legal or tax advice, and it does not make your church compliant on its own — that remains the responsibility of your office bearers. Your own auditor or tax practitioner should confirm that your arrangements meet your obligations.