Does anyone have a good way to track their charitable giving throughout the year? I didn’t bother previously because I wasn’t in a place to donate all that much, but things have changed. Not looking to reinvent the wheel–I’m sure there are downloadable Google sheets for this purpose, but I know this forum is home to more than a few Excel Queensand I’m wondering if y’all have any tips/tricks/trackers to share!
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Oooh great question: I tend to just try to remember where I’ve donated and then search my gmail for receipts, but that can’t be the best possible way to do it.
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Post it note. Yes, I’m super techy why do you ask? 
Most of my donations are to a local food pantry and not itemized on taxes or anything, but I like to know how much it is for the year.
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My Capital One credit card sends me a roundup email with what it’s AI thinks is donations and it’s not far off, but I know there are way more that I don’t do via that card.
Sometimes lo-fi is the way to go!
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Nothing fancy here…I’ve got a spreadsheet with the name of the charity, the specific cause if applicable, the date, and whether it’s matched for work (this part lets me make sure I can max out matching through my company, the IRS doesn’t care). Email receipts from the charity go in the same folder, and at tax time I go through and enter them one at a time.
I don’t donate enough ‘stuff’ to make it worth tracking, generally, and the ‘round up to an even dollar to support XYZ’ get lost too…in other years I used to have mileage/dates in the same spreadsheet but since tutoring is all online currently that hasn’t been relevant for a couple years either.
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I’m old enough I used to do this by putting a single sheet of loose leaf paper in my Taxes folder and noting the date, charity, amount and check number each time I made a donation.
Most charities will send you a statement either at the end of the year, or each time a donation is made, or sometimes both. I put those in the Taxes folder as they arrived too.
If you track expenses, consider designating a charity category. Then you can easily pull those transactions up when you need them.
More recently I put together a spreadsheet equivalent of taxable events. I’m finding this method to be less reliable than the pencil and paper method I used to use.
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I put in as a budget category in YNAB and then categorize all the transactions as “giving”
I don’t put it on my taxes though so I’m not like trying to save receipts
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A lot of my more recent donations are reoccurring monthly (automate or die!) so I bet I could do that already. Thanks!
My company matches a lot of stuff, so tracking my donations more formally will ensure I actually do the legwork to get it matched. Great idea, thanks!
I have a ynab category for recurring ones. Anything one off I add a ‘donation receipt’ tag in Gmail and tag the confirmation email.
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A tag in gmail! This is genius!
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I do this except with my manual spreadsheets because I’m that dork.
And same, I donate a lot but since I don’t itemize, receipts don’t matter. I do end up keeping them (both paper and e-receipts) for a while, but… ehhhh I don’t actually do anything with them.
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Is there a reason you don’t itemize?
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Sometimes I just wanna see EVERYONE’S spreadsheets!!
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The standard deduction is better than itemizing for me – I don’t own a house or have high medical bills, so it’s only the donations that would be itemizable. I’d have to donate well over 10% of my gross income to make itemizing just for donations worth it (and I’m not quite there yet haha).
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Hmmm me either!! I suppose I can get into the habit of tracking so I can keep getting my employer match where possible and just to have a pulse on things 
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I own a house and have a kid but we still take the standard deduction because it’s higher now. You can only itemize medical expenses if they exceed ~7% of your AGI.
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You don’t have to itemize to claim a deduction for donations on the federal form. The deduction is up to $300 S, HOH or QW and up to $600 MFJ.
Not a lot but better than nothing.
Some states also have deductions for charitable giving even if you don’t itemize.
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I use the Intuit tool ‘It’s deductible’, because they have a tool that estimates the value of clothing/item donations. I mostly remember to add other donations! I’ve tried other tracking methods but never remembered to Do The Thing.