Simplifying the Digital Basket 2.0 (NAATW 2025)

Transcript

This transcript has been lightly edited for readability from the original caption file. Speaker names are standardized using first name and last initial where available. Timestamps are adjusted so the edited audio begins at 0:00.

Presentation: Simplifying the Digital Basket 2.0. Presenter: Christina V.. From the NAATW 2025 Workshop.

This transcript was split from a combined VTT containing two presentations and covers the Digital Basket session from approximately 0:01 to 25:21 of the source transcript.

[0:00] Digital Payments and the Need for Guidance

[0:00] Christina V.: And you guys probably thought that I was crazy, because you didn't want to use digital wallets. Nobody was using digital payments back in 2019. Well, at least not a lot. In 2020, though, COVID happened. And we saw an increase of 1,900% in digital payment processing. It was dramatic and it was huge and they estimate that it's probably going to be somewhere around like 5.5 billion by the end of this year. And so, what we've learned, or what we had to do, is we had to learn. Very quickly and dramatically. Why isn't this going?

[0:37] Privacy, Anonymity, and Personal Information

[0:37] Christina V.: Thank you. what exactly we could do as a group? Because we found out that using digital payment processing systems required some personal information. Like, it requires, like, my cell phone number, or an address, or a bank account, and where do these things go? I'll give you an example of my home group. We let the treasurer use his own personal Venmo. And I have a small group. I'm in a very rural community. But there's people, and it's justified that they say, I don't want my treasurer to use their personal Venmo, so how do we set it up? So the challenges that we've seen these past couple years is. Do we get a dedicated cell phone? Do we get a dedicated bank account? Do we get a dedicated person? Because we don't want to break anybody's anonymity. You go into platforms like Venmo or PayPal, and you can see my name associated with the transaction. I can hide what I sent.

[1:29] Christina V.: But I'm usually going to put, like, a little dollar sign, or maybe I'll put, like, seventh as my comment, or whatever. So my information's still out there for the world to see, and that. is, uncomfortable for some people. And so, we talk about, you know, I'm also part of an organization that does, that's a non-profit, and what they've decided to do, because they're big enough, is they've got a dedicated cell phone number, they've got a dedicated bank account, they've got a dedicated everything. for this, but I understand that it can't be necessarily the feasible option for every single group. So, what do we do about it, right? So, you've got these choices of.

[2:10] Community Organizations vs. Nonprofits

[2:10] Christina V.: Are you a community organization, or are you a non-profit? And those are really the two avenues that I'm going to explore right now. Because those are the ones that I find that I have the most experience with. So you might want to know, like, what is a community organization? Well. That is your local A.A. group. My local A.A. group is a community organization. Now, you're going to, in these slides, when they get posted, the links to everything are in these slides, so this is not just me telling you what it can be done, okay? This is coming from, like, the A.A. guidelines on finance. My contributions to my home group are not necessarily tax-deductible, because we are not a 501 or C3, okay? so I need to take that into consideration.

[2:52] Christina V.: And then we have non-profits, and then non-profits. There are certain restrictions and regulations that will tell you what you can do and how you can be a non-profit. my contributions to a non-profit are tax deductible. And so there's all these tricky little, you know, things to keep in mind. and so you wonder, where do I go? You know, you've got an organization, and you want to grow, and you want to, you know, get good financial solutions for that organization. Let's talk with the community organization. You can, as an A.A. group. Set up a bank account and get an FEIN number so that it's not associated with a social security number. The FEIN number can be obtained for banking purposes only. You do not have to. go through the process of getting organized in your state of residence. You don't have to get. you don't have to file tax returns, typically.

[3:51] Christina V.: And what this allows your group to do. is to not have that bank account tied to an individual's social security number, or an individual's address, but it does require a few things, like maybe a local address. I know for us, our district will allow us to use their PO Box address for mail. You know, so maybe that might be an option that you can explore. And it's a really, really cool thing, to know that if I wanted my group to take this path, that we could have that FEIN number, which is the Federal Employment Identification Number. And uh… and it would go directly to the bank account. So then when you have your treasurer or your officers rotate, you would go down to the bank. You would update your officers, but it's still not associated to somebody's social security number or personal information.

[4:39] Christina V.: It's completely your group. some other experiences that I've had, you know, in these past couple years is… 501c3. You know, what do you need? I've got little meters on my slide, right? Because the group is really easy.

[4:52] Administrative Requirements and Complexity

[4:55] Christina V.: But you go into a non-profit, and it becomes really rather hard. You know, you need to have a mailing address. You need to have an IRS registration as a non-profit. You need to have your FEIN number. You have to have a bank account, or you should have a bank account, right? And then there's annual maintenance that goes along with that. And what we found… what I found is that the annual maintenance looks like filing… I'm going to use California as an example, because I'm from California. We have a Secretary of State annual filing requirements, like 50 bucks or something like that, but you must do that in order to maintain. Your status as a company that's incorporated in California. You have financial responsibilities within that state, maybe California sales tax, maybe California excise tax, depending on what you do.

[5:43] Christina V.: And then you do have some annual filing requirements with the IRS in order to maintain. that status as well. So just things to keep in consideration when you're talking about a spirit of rotation. is to take a look and see what do you need? Talk to your group. What are your goals? What are you looking to obtain? with these, with the accounts and how you want to get set up. because I find that it's super, super important. just to have these conversations, you know? Found that, there is an organization that I'm involved with, uh. And they are a 501c3, and… They have a very hard time when it comes to the spirit of rotation for their treasurer. Because it's rather difficult to find somebody who can do the appropriate filings for these forms, you know? And then if you think about your local intergroup, your local inner group is probably, I mean, mine is.

[6:36] Christina V.: a 501c3. And what they have to do every single year is not only file a tax return, but they also have to, you know. report California sales tax, for example. And so, who has the ability and the capability to do that? Are you outsourcing and making sure that you have somebody that's competent in order to do so? because these are really important financial, you know, considerations to keep in the back of your mind. And then you go back to your home group, you know? My home group, we're small, we don't have to file a tax return. We have no interest in becoming a non-profit, you know? The only thing we want is, as young people, is to reach the next suffering young person and welcome them into the rooms, you know? So my experience with financial responsibilities, you know, is very varied, and I encourage you.

[7:17] Resources and Financial Responsibility

[7:22] Christina V.: to get on the Slack, ask questions, you know, because it's… I've been told it's an important topic. It's going to be the least technical topic you're going to hear this weekend is this one right here, okay? But, you know, again, it's really important, and what I've done in this particular slide is I've combined all of the resources. So anything that you guys might want to know, can be here. the A.A. guidelines on finance, you know, what is community organization? The links to set up a federal identification number if you guys wanted to, um… And again, just additional resources. If you're not in the state of California. You just go on your web browser and search for Secretary of State. If you were looking to do some sort of non-profit action. Every single one has one.

[8:08] Christina V.: and I, I think that's it. I'm going to try to keep this brief in case there's any questions, so thank you so much for letting me share, and I'll take questions now. Or actually, Buck has an announcement, and then…

[8:27] Host: Thank you, Christina. we'll take announce… we'll take announcements. We'll take comments and questions.

[8:28] Questions and Discussion

[8:34] Host: Both in person, online. you'll have 2 minutes. At the end of 2 minutes, I'll be standing over here, and I'll tell you when it's time. It's 2 minutes, so here we go. Okay. Do you have any questions on the line? If you have a question here, I'd like to walk the mic. The microphone, please. Yeah, if you have a question, please come up here and walk up to the microphone. If you're online, please raise your digital hand. And we'll make sure that we take a look at you, too. Yeah, and please, speak closely into the microphone. No, that's wrong. Okay, what's one fifth, I think, is what it is. is, community organization, is that, um… Is that, like, a officially recognized, like, entity?

[9:25] Audience member: with the IRS, or… I was trying to search for online, like, exactly, like. you know, I suppose maybe all of that answers are in the PowerPoint links, but maybe you can just briefly talk about, like. How does that… is distinct from a 501c3? Is it just simply part of the umbrella? It's a great question. The question, in case you guys didn't hear it online, is what is the distinguishing factor for a community organization? And I'm not going to pretend that I've created this, and the A.A. guidelines for finance, okay? And it's in the PowerPoint presentation that you guys can link to as well.

[10:00] Christina V.: A community organization is just a group of people that come together and share, you know, similar ideas, right? And there are some instances where those community organizations, based on their structure, would need to have some sort of formalized IRS. reporting, but regular A.A. groups. No, and that's really laid out in the guidelines for finance, the really distinguishing factor is. A community organization, your contributions, your seventh tradition is not tax deductible. If you wanted to have something that was tax-deductible, you'd have to find somebody that was a registered 501c3, and you can actually find the list of registered nonprofits on the IRS website page, which I think I put in the slides, too, but… just… I hope that answers your question. Okay, great. Let's go online. Ray? M?

[11:08] Christina V.: Hi, re-alcoholic. my question was specifically for Venmo. You had talked about a community organization. I know I commented this with. Ray, you're unmuted now. But we can't hear him. How about we go… Oh, yep. Got you. Can you guys hear me better now? Sorry about that. So, I deal with, a lot of times, different groups in the community organization thing. what type of Venmo would that be? Would it be a business one? and it sounded like that the best way was to… get a unique cell phone number that was not somebody's to be able to transfer things from treasure to treasurer. I didn't know if you could, uh… elaborate a little bit more on that, if any of those questions come up. Yeah, absolutely. So, it's an excellent question. Groups do it as they want to do it, but I will give you a really, really good example.

[12:04] Christina V.: one of the community organizations that I'm a part of, they have opted to buy one of those prepaid Walmart cell phones or something, you know, like $25 or something, and it's got the minutes, because. legitimately, what Venmo wants is they want to be able to associate your account with a cell phone, and then those trans… like, it needs to happen. So they'll pay, like, $25 every couple of, you know, weeks or months or something, and they'll build that into their expenses so they have that registered cell phone. It's dedicated to the group, and then they can transfer that over to the new treasurer, whoever that ends up being. Does that… I hope that answers your question. It does, and then the type of Venmo, if you are… I didn't know about the community organization thing, so I'm gonna look into that, but is that a business Venmo at that point? Oh!

[12:50] Christina V.: my home group uses my treasurer's Venmo, so we don't use a business Venmo. If you do do a business Venmo, they'll charge a transaction fee, I think it's like 3.2% or 2.9%. So, they don't have the distinction that I'm aware of for Venmo. It's either individual or it's business, and so that would be a group conscious decision on which way you'd want to go ahead and set that up. For your particular group. And can you do an individual… when you're a community organization, I guess would be my question. I've seen it happen. I'm not going to tell you yes or no that you should or shouldn't do it, but I have seen it happen, because that way.

[13:28] Christina V.: you know, individuals. I'll give you an example. This is not AA-related, right? But the person who does my nails, they like to use Venmo, but they don't have a Venmo account because they don't want to pay the business transaction fees. I mean, she's a business, but, you know. So I guess it depends on how your group wanted to organize and structure their Venmo account. Thank you so much. You're very welcome. Alright, in person? Alcoholic here, and uh… My home group wanted to do the electronic transactions.

[13:59] Audience member: Crystal microphone. Thank you. I'm, going through what he went through, and he didn't want to get the 1099 form that some of the, uh. providers, like Venmo, PayPal, etc, will accumulate all your transactions and. send you a form that you send to the tax people. So, individual was not good. What he found was. a consolidation place called, HomeGroup Online. They take transactions from any provider, Venmo, PayPal, your bank, whatever. And accumulated. in an account set up by. Our home group treasurer, so that he has a debit card by HomeGroup Online, can move the money from. online to our group bank account. Very, simple. And it satisfied his desire not to get, uh. Engage, it can pass down from treasure to treasure.

[14:58] Shared Experience: HomeGroup Online and Banking

[15:01] Audience member: Thank you so much, Greg, for that information.

[15:06] Host / Christina V.: Online? Terry, uh… I'm gonna guess Terry Oh is our next one on line? Let me set the timer, please. Guys back there, can you reset the timer for the questions? Terry, would you like to share with us? Oh! Hi, Patrick. I'm not Terry, but I just got unmuted, so… Alright, people, so… Hi, good morning, my name is Patrick, I'm an alcoholic. Area 72, tech and web chair, and special shout-out to Shu, our web service, she's over there, hey, Shu. thank you for this. So, one quick thing about the community organization. our local credit unions, they know all about this, and they have some special account that. doesn't pay interest, and it's very, low-key, they just… Yeah, no… no… not much paperwork required, so… credit unions know all about this. Um… I'm… I'm just here to ask for more, people sharing specifically what their groups and or districts do.

[16:15] Host / Christina V.: this question of how do we take online payments is one of the biggest… is one of the most common questions that we get. from the district web chairs, and we talked about a couple of the platforms, but I would really love to hear from people just sharing more about. What they use specifically, what has worked well and what hasn't worked well. I know that a lot of this stuff is obvious to a lot of the people in this room. But it's very not obvious to other people involved in service, so… Just some kind of the nitty-gritty from people would be… would be really, really helpful. I'd love to take it back to. Alright, thank you. Thanks, Patrick. for those of you guys in line, or online and in person, if you guys want to engage in that conversation in the Slack channel. and provide some solutions for what you guys are doing, that would be great.

[17:05] Terry O.: I've unmuted Terry O. online, if you would like to take our question at this time. All right, in person? Yeah, we can, absolutely. Terry? Hi, Terry, it's great to see you again.

[17:15] Digital Payment Growth and Additional Questions

[17:15] Terry O.: Hi! Thank you, thank you, I'm… Already learning so much, I really like this. Will you repeat the part you said after you mentioned at the be… at part of your presentation about the 1,900% increase in, And then something about 3 billion, that was fascinating, and I… but I missed the detail, that detail. Thank you. Yeah, thank you for the question. I… the web research that I did showed that in 2019, there was, like, 1.3 or 1.5 million digital payment users that were registered.

[17:49] Christina V.: And in the span of the COVID pandemic from 2019 to 2020. We increased to 2.3 billion, and that was a 1,900% increase in just the span of a year.

[18:06] David: Hi. Fiverr, please. Hi, my name's David. I'm an alcoholic, I'm from Suffolk, New York. And, thank you very much for the presentation. I just want to, uh. clarity on something. You mentioned that you didn't need a social security number for the EIN. I was under the impression that you do supply social security number for, like, a responsible party. But they're just not taxed. It's just something that needs. That needs to be tied to that EIN. I believe that for the purposes of business banking only, the form is a lot more streamlined, and you're able to put a responsible individual without having to have a social security number. But I can double check that for sure. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. And, too, and this is just, uh.

[18:54] David: my home group, we use, um… Oh, I'm sorry, what I was gonna say is, like, you know, the whole Venmo… Personal versus Venmo Business. I certainly have an opinion on that. I was actually surprised when I went to the ICOA.A. And found out that intergroups use personal Venmo accounts, which is… and I… but the HomeGroup Online is a great solution. They do use Venmo Business. Just so people know, and there's a 1% kind of, like, surcharge on all funds, that kind of flow through that account, but it's a great solution.

[19:28] Audience member: Thanks. Right, thank you so much. Okay. Okay, online? Yes, can you hear me? Can you hear me? Susan, would you like to share with us? Okay. Hi, I'm Susan, I'm an alcoholic, I currently… Yes. I'm from Elkton, Maryland, first of all, and I currently serve at OIA and PAC. policy and admissions. And I'm also here at 12 past delegate. My group went online, split. It was hybrid at first and split. And setting up a bank account was daunting. We gotta… bank account, local bank account… as a community, what did you call it? Community organization. And attached it to Cash App. It was impossible to change the ownership of Cash App. Then we did open an account at a group online, so we have two two banking accounts. Most of our money comes into the local bank. We're trying to decide whether to eliminate one. of those. The red flag for me about HomeGroup Online is the guy started asking for

[20:54] Audience member: contributions claiming to be an… a service board claiming to be a non-profit. Um… it's a red flag for me. I… I don't know whether anybody else has any experience with this. It would be helpful, and I'll take this rest of this, either listen to you, or… take it to chat, thank you.

[21:21] Host: Thank you. Alright. Hi, I'm Leslie, I'm an alcoholic. Hi, Leslie. I'm from, um… It's better. Hi, I'm Leslie, alcoholic. Hi. And, I'm from Area 34, Western Michigan. and this is a great topic, and I think, you know, the.

[21:53] Leslie: financial and our contributions are our heartbeat. That's how we survive. And I would really maybe like to see us do a sharing session. the sharing session that we do on a quarterly basis, maybe we could take it to monthly and specifically pick this topic. But my question is, we recently became a 501c in our area. We had lots of people freaking out about the traditions and, you know, all of that, but… I would like to see maybe a specific category in Slack. that talks about, this specific topic. Because it goes from our areas to our districts to our home groups, to GSO, who's using what app. you know, the Home Group app that the gentleman just mentioned. And a great… some sort of… home base where we can ask all these financial.

[22:48] Leslie: Questions. Yeah. It's a great suggestion, and I'm going to refer you guys back to the A.A. guidelines on finance, okay? because they have so much good information in there, and it talks about community organizations, it talks about non-profits, it talks about a lot of different things. that we just don't have time to cover, but bring it up in the Slack, though, too, because you never know who might have some sort of presentation. I'm not the first one to be talking about this. I know that there's been other areas, other districts that have been.

[23:09] Resources, Slack, and Closing Reflections

[23:17] Christina V.: you know, having these same conversations around security, privacy, anonymity, all for the digital contributions and how to accept them, so… Thank you for your question. It's a great question. Oh, and if you guys want to suggest a Birds of a Feather topic so we could talk about this more tonight, please do so. We've got online Birds of a Feather, the guys can put up a QR code for you guys that are in person to scan the little QR code. And the birds of a feather can also be found in the Glide app, or your welcome email, and you can submit a topic that way, too.

[23:52] Host / Krista: We have… we have time for one more. Oh, and it looks like that might be my friend Krista. Hey, Krista, how's it going? Hey, Krista. Hey guys, I'm Krista, and I'm an alcoholic. just a reminder that, I just went back to TIA.A. to look at all these topics. if you haven't been to TIA.A. Um… go there, because everything we've just talked about. Including me and my own searches for, like, my home group does cash only, God forbid we do anything else. It's cash. But… but there's so many resources already on there. So, I always want to reinvent the wheel and think about new things. It's actually all there. Search money, search contributions, search 7th tradition. But there are so many different resources for however, wherever you are. And however your group does it, just take a few minutes and kind of look through those posts.

[24:50] Host / Krista: There are sharing sessions. I think a technology sharing session did one on money, but anyway, it's all there just to… Friendly reminder, like, there's so many great tools right there on, the forso that's all I wanted to share. Thanks! Thanks, Krista, and thanks for showing that, or pointing that out. It's greatly appreciated, and that's all the time I've got, so thank you so much for allowing me to share.