Merging or Consolidating Locals

When two or more of your locals join, your Grand Body office moves their members into one local in Groupable. This guide covers what to do before, during and after.

Who does it: a Grand Body office user whose role allows merging locals, such as a Group Admin. The local secretaries help with the steps before and after.

It cannot be undone. Finish "Before you start" first.

Merger or consolidation?

The steps are the same. The only difference is where the members end up.

• Consolidation: one local continues. The others close, and their members move into it.
• Merger: all the old locals close and form a new local with a new name or number. First add the new local (Add Local Group in the Local Groups card menu). Then move each old local into it.

The form moves one closing local at a time. To combine three locals, run it twice.

Before you start

Do these for each local that will close. Its secretary can do most of them.

1. Bring the records up to date. Enter every member change and dues payment.
2. Clear the Untransferred Funds tab. Anything still there on the day of the merge is marked as handed to the closing local's treasurer.
3. Save a member list with dues categories. On the local's Overview, find the Members and Others card. Set "entries per page" to All and click Excel. Do this on each tab of the card. The secretary of the local that continues uses this list to set dues afterward.

4. Save the money records. On the Income & Expenses tab, click Manage Budgets. Print or save each budget period you want to keep. The closed local's records stay in Groupable, but a saved copy is easier to hand to its treasurer or auditors.
5. Agree on the date. Use the date the merger took effect. Each moved member's history shows this date.

Run the merge

1. On your Grand Body dashboard, open the menu (three lines) on the Local Groups card. Click Merge Locals.

You can also start from a local's Overview: click Consolidate Locals. That local is filled in as the one that closes.

2. Read the yellow Caution panel.
3. Under Consolidate, pick the local that closes (Demising local).
4. Under Into, pick the local that continues (Surviving Local). For a merger, pick the new local.
5. Under As of, enter the date of the merger.
6. Check all three. Click Consolidate once.
7. Wait. A large local can take a minute. When it is done, the page of the local that continues opens.

If more than one local is closing, repeat these steps for each one.

If Merge Locals shows a message asking you to contact us instead of the form, click Help in the lower right corner. We will turn it on for your Grand Body.

What the merge does

To the closing local:

• Its status changes to Merged. It moves to the Inactive Locals tab on your dashboard.
• Its offices end on the merge date.
• Its open budget period closes.
• Money still on its Untransferred Funds tab is marked as handed to its treasurer.
• Its Connect page turns off. Its posts, photos and files move to the Connect page of the local that continues.

To its members:

• Every member, past and present, moves to the local that continues. Each one gets a "Consolidated Out" event and a "Consolidated In" event, dated the merge date.
• Each keeps the same membership type and status. Inactive and deceased members come along as inactive and deceased.
• A member who already belonged to both locals ends up with one membership in the local that continues.
• They arrive with no dues category and no dues owed. Unpaid dues stay on the closed local's records.

Also moved to the local that continues:

• Donations.
• Endowed memberships, if your Grand Body uses Endowments.
• Store orders, invoices and payments, if your Grand Body uses the Groupable Store.

The local that continues keeps its officers, dues categories, money records and Stripe account.

If your Grand Body uses Annual Member Activity Reports, the open reports for both locals update about an hour later.

After the merge

1. Check the Consolidation History. On the Info/Officers tab of the local that continues, the Consolidation History card lists the closed local and its date.

2. Set dues for the moved members. The secretary gives each one a dues category and enters any dues owed, using the member list saved before the merge. Your Grand Body office decides whether unpaid dues carry over. These guides help: Add or Change Dues Categories, Bulk Edit Dues Screen and How to Start Using Dues Mid-Year.
3. Print dues cards if you need them. Your Grand Body office clicks Queue Dues Cards next to the closed local in the Consolidation History card. Enter the year and click Save. This queues a card for each active member who pays dues. Then print from Dues Cards as usual.
4. For a merger, set up the new local. Record its officers. Set up its dues categories and its money records. A new local has no Stripe account, so it can't take online payments until someone creates one: Stripe Accounts: Instructions to Create a Merchant Account to Process Payments.

Questions?

Ask your Grand Body office, or click Help in the lower right corner of any page.