Last updated 2026-07-24
TL;DR
A nonprofit treasurer tracks every dollar in and out, keeps the bank reconciled monthly, files the right IRS Form 990 variant every year, and hands over clean records to the next person. For a small booster club or PTO, that's usually a 990-N e-Postcard if gross receipts stay under $50,000 a year [1]. Miss three straight years of filing and the IRS auto-revokes your tax-exempt status [2].
What does a treasurer do?
A treasurer is the person legally and practically responsible for an organization's money. That means recording every deposit and withdrawal, keeping the bank statements reconciled, paying bills on time, and producing a clear picture of what the group has, owes, and can spend, whenever the board asks. It is not a ceremonial title. If you're the treasurer of a 15-person booster club or a 400-family PTO, you're the one who knows whether the group can actually afford the new uniforms it just voted to buy. You're also the one who gets the call when a state charity office or the IRS sends a letter nobody understands. Most small nonprofits don't have a bookkeeper or accountant on staff. That work falls entirely on a volunteer treasurer, often someone who has never done this before and inherited a shoebox of receipts from last year's parent. The job is smaller than corporate finance but the stakes (losing tax-exempt status, a raffle license, or the trust of other parents) are real.
What is a treasurer, exactly, in a volunteer organization?
In a volunteer nonprofit, a treasurer is an elected or appointed officer, usually named in the bylaws, who has authority over financial records and (often) check-signing or bank access. The bylaws should say how the treasurer is chosen, what they can approve without board vote, and who else has to co-sign checks over a certain amount. If your organization is incorporated as a nonprofit and has federal tax-exempt status, the treasurer role also intersects with IRS reporting obligations. The IRS doesn't require a specific job title, but whoever prepares or signs the annual return needs to know the group's total gross receipts and total assets, because that determines which version of Form 990 applies [1]. Many booster clubs and PTOs are chartered under a state or national parent organization (a state PTA, a booster council, a youth sports league). If yours is, check whether the parent org handles a group exemption filing or whether each local unit files its own 990. This detail trips up a lot of first-time treasurers who assume someone else is filing for them.
What do treasurers do day to day, month to month, and year to year?
The job breaks into three rhythms. Daily/weekly: deposit checks and cash promptly (don't let money sit in a car or a coat pocket), record every transaction with a date, amount, and purpose, and keep receipts for anything paid out. Monthly: reconcile the bank statement against your ledger, report a simple income/expense summary to the board, and flag anything unusual (a bounced check, a missing deposit, a bill nobody approved). Annually: prepare or review the budget, close out the fiscal year, file the correct IRS Form 990 variant by the deadline (the 15th day of the 5th month after your fiscal year ends [2]), renew any state charitable solicitation registration if required, and prepare a handoff packet in case you're not treasurer next year. A lot of groups skip the handoff step, and it's the single biggest reason new treasurers walk into a mess. If you want a structural head start on that, a [990](/articles/treasurer-basics/990) filing calendar tied to your fiscal year, kept somewhere the next treasurer can actually find it, solves most of this.
What does a club treasurer do differently from a corporate one?
A club treasurer (booster club, PTO, youth sports league, alumni group) is almost always a volunteer working a few hours a month, not a trained accountant. The core duties are the same as any nonprofit treasurer: track money, reconcile the bank, report to the board, file the annual return. What's different is scale and tools. Most small clubs use a simple spreadsheet or a low-cost tool like a basic accounting app instead of QuickBooks Enterprise. Most have gross receipts well under $50,000 a year, which usually means the simplest IRS filing tier applies [3]. And most club treasurers also handle physical cash from bake sales, concession stands, and raffles, which corporate treasurers rarely touch directly. Cash handling is where club treasurers get burned. Two people should count concession-stand cash together and both sign a count sheet. One person handling cash alone, with no second set of eyes, is how honest mistakes and dishonest ones both go unnoticed for years.
What is Form 990 and why does the treasurer file it?
| 990-N (e-Postcard) | Smallest orgs | Normally $50,000 or less [3] | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 990-EZ | Small/mid orgs | Gross receipts under $200,000 and total assets under $500,000 [5] | |
| 990 (full) | Larger orgs | Gross receipts of $200,000 or more, or assets of $500,000 or more [5] | |
| 990-PF | Private foundations | All private foundations, regardless of size [5] | Most booster clubs and small PTOs land in the 990-N tier. That form asks for basic identifying information (EIN, tax year, legal name, confirmation gross receipts are $50,000 or less) and takes a few minutes online through the IRS's e-Postcard system [3]. There's no dollar figure disclosure required on a 990-N the way there is on the EZ or full 990. For background on the form family, see form 990 and irs form 990. |
Form 990 is the annual information return that most tax-exempt organizations file with the IRS to report income, expenses, and activities. The IRS describes it as the form organizations use to "provide the IRS with the information required by section 6033" [4]. It's public: anyone can look up a nonprofit's 990 through the IRS's Tax Exempt Organization Search or sites like ProPublica's Nonprofit Explorer. There isn't one single 990. There are several versions based on size: | Filing | Who files it | Gross receipts threshold |
What is the 990 tax form used for, in plain terms?
It's the IRS's way of checking that a tax-exempt organization is still behaving like one: not making a profit for private individuals, still doing the charitable or educational work it claimed, and not sitting on a stash of money it isn't using for its mission. It's also the public transparency document. Donors, parent volunteers, and state charity regulators use 990s to see how a nonprofit spends money. If your booster club has ever had a parent ask "where does the money actually go," the honest answer is: it should be visible on the 990, or in your board's financial reports if you're small enough to only file the 990-N (which doesn't require expense breakdowns). Failing to file isn't a paperwork inconvenience, it's an existential risk. The IRS states plainly: "Organizations that fail to file required returns or notices for three consecutive years will automatically lose their tax-exempt status" [6]. That's not a fine, that's a full revocation. Recovering it means re-applying, sometimes paying a new filing fee, and possibly amending prior years. For the mechanics, see 990 tax form and 990n.
What is the 990-N e-Postcard specifically?
The 990-N, nicknamed the e-Postcard, is the short-form annual notice for the smallest tax-exempt organizations. The IRS's own guidance says organizations "whose gross receipts are normally $50,000 or less" file the 990-N instead of a 990 or 990-EZ [3]. It's filed online only, through the IRS's e-Postcard system linked from irs.gov. There's no paper option. You'll need your EIN, the organization's legal name and any alternate names, your mailing address, your website if you have one, the name and address of a principal officer, your tax year, and confirmation that gross receipts are $50,000 or under [3]. There's no extension available for the 990-N and technically no late penalty for a single missed year, but miss three years running and you're auto-revoked under the same three-year rule that applies to every 990 variant [6]. If you inherited a club and aren't sure the prior treasurer filed, check the IRS Tax Exempt Organization Search tool before assuming everything's fine. See form 990-n for a filing walkthrough.
What financial records does a treasurer need to keep?
At minimum: a checkbook register or ledger of every transaction, monthly bank statements and reconciliations, receipts or invoices for every expense, a copy of every year's filed 990 (or 990-N confirmation email), board meeting minutes approving major expenses, and your EIN confirmation letter (IRS Form CP 575 or successor letter). The IRS's general guidance for exempt organizations is to keep records that support items reported on your annual return, and to hang onto them long enough to satisfy any federal, state, or funder requirement (many groups use a rule of thumb of at least three to seven years). If you've ever amended a return or had a gap in filings, keep everything related to that period indefinitely. A lot of booster clubs lose this history entirely when a treasurer moves on without a real handoff. That's the most common failure mode in volunteer treasury work, not fraud, just entropy. One person quits, the shared drive access lapses, the checkbook goes in a garage, and eighteen months later nobody can find the EIN.
What happens if a nonprofit's tax-exempt status gets auto-revoked?
The IRS publishes an Auto-Revocation List of organizations that lost exempt status for not filing three consecutive years [6]. Once revoked, the organization is treated as a taxable entity going forward and any donations made to it are no longer tax-deductible for donors, which is a real problem if your booster club solicits parent contributions. Recovery is possible through what the IRS calls retroactive reinstatement, filed on Form 1023 or 1023-EZ (for the 501(c)(3) route) with a required statement explaining the reasonable cause for the filing failures. Smaller organizations that were eligible to file a 990-N or 990-EZ for the years they missed often qualify for a streamlined retroactive process under Revenue Procedure 2014-11, but you should confirm current eligibility and any fee amount directly with the IRS, since fee schedules and procedures change . This is exactly the situation where a lot of treasurers panic and either do nothing (making it worse) or hire an expensive accountant for a problem that, for a small all-volunteer club, is often solvable by carefully following IRS instructions. Confirm your specific path with the IRS and, if your state requires charitable registration, with your state charity office too, before filing anything.
How does state raffle and fundraising oversight fit into a treasurer's job?
In most states, running a raffle, bingo night, or public solicitation for donations requires separate state-level permission on top of your federal tax-exempt status. This is usually handled by the state Attorney General's charities division or a state gaming/licensing board, and it's a different process from anything the IRS handles. Requirements vary enormously by state: some require a raffle license with a flat fee, some cap prize values, some require a post-event financial report showing gross receipts and where the proceeds went. A treasurer typically has to supply the financial numbers for that filing even if someone else (a board president, a compliance volunteer) submits the paperwork. Because this varies so much state to state and changes periodically, confirm current rules with your state charity office or Attorney General's charitable/gaming division before running any raffle or public solicitation. Don't rely on what last year's treasurer did; rules do get updated.
What internal controls should a treasurer set up?
Even a five-person volunteer board benefits from basic separation of duties. The person who collects cash shouldn't be the only person who counts it. The person who writes checks shouldn't be the only signer on the account. The person who reconciles the bank statement, ideally, isn't the same person who made every deposit. Practical controls that scale down to volunteer size: require two signatures on checks above a set dollar threshold your board picks, require two people to count and sign off on any cash from an event, deposit cash within a few days rather than holding it, and have someone other than the treasurer (a board member, a second officer) glance at the bank statement each month before it's filed away. None of this is about distrust. It protects the treasurer as much as the organization. If numbers are ever questioned, a clean paper trail with two sets of eyes on every cash count is the fastest way to clear it up.
How should a treasurer hand off the books to the next person?
Build the handoff packet before you need it, not during the scramble when you're stepping down. It should include: the EIN and any login credentials for the IRS e-Postcard system or state portals, the last three years of filed 990s or 990-N confirmations, current bank account numbers and signers, a copy of the bylaws' financial sections, the current fiscal year budget and actuals, and a one-page summary of any recurring bills, memberships, or state renewals due. Walk the incoming treasurer through the current bank reconciliation in person or on a call if you can. A lot of gaps happen simply because nobody explained why a line item exists. This is the part a lot of clubs skip entirely, and it's the single most preventable cause of missed filings and lost records. A BoosterLedger $99 one-time State-Personalized Treasurer Kit is built specifically to package this handoff, with your state's raffle and registration rules and a 990 filing calendar tied to your actual fiscal year, so the next volunteer isn't starting from a blank folder.
Frequently asked questions
What does a treasurer do?
A treasurer tracks all money in and out of an organization: deposits, expenses, bank reconciliation, and reporting to the board. For a nonprofit, that also includes filing the correct IRS Form 990 variant each year and keeping records that support it. It's a hands-on record-keeping job, not a ceremonial title.
What is a treasurer?
A treasurer is an officer of an organization, usually named in the bylaws, responsible for its money: recording transactions, reconciling accounts, and reporting financial status to the board. In a nonprofit, the treasurer often also handles or oversees annual IRS filings like Form 990 or 990-N.
What do treasurers do?
They record deposits and expenses, reconcile bank statements monthly, prepare budget and financial reports for the board, file the annual IRS return (990-N, 990-EZ, or 990 depending on size), and maintain records for handoff to the next treasurer. In clubs, they often also oversee cash handling at events.
What a treasurer does in a small club or booster group?
In a booster club or PTO, the treasurer collects and deposits money from dues, concessions, and fundraisers, pays approved bills, reconciles the bank account, reports numbers at meetings, and files the group's 990-N or other required IRS return each year. Most of this is done part-time by a volunteer, not an accountant.
What is Form 990?
Form 990 is the annual information return most tax-exempt organizations file with the IRS to report income, expenses, and activities under Internal Revenue Code section 6033. There are several versions (990-N, 990-EZ, full 990, 990-PF) depending on the organization's gross receipts and assets.
What does a treasurer do in a club?
A club treasurer keeps the club's checkbook or ledger current, deposits cash and check income promptly, pays bills the board has approved, reports a simple income/expense summary at meetings, and handles any required annual IRS or state filings. For sports and school clubs, this usually also means overseeing cash counts at concession stands or fundraisers.
What does a club treasurer do that's different from other officers?
Unlike the president or secretary, the treasurer has direct access to the bank account and legal responsibility for accurate financial reporting. Other officers vote on spending; the treasurer executes it, records it, and answers for the numbers at tax filing time and during any audit or handoff.
What is a 990 tax form?
It's the informational tax return the IRS requires most tax-exempt nonprofits to file annually, reporting revenue, expenses, and organizational activity. Small organizations with gross receipts under roughly $50,000 typically file the short 990-N e-Postcard instead of the longer 990 or 990-EZ forms.
What is the 990?
The 990 is the IRS's annual public reporting form for tax-exempt organizations. It documents income, spending, and governance so the IRS and the public can see the organization is operating consistently with its tax-exempt purpose. Which version applies depends on gross receipts and total assets.
What does a treasurer of a club do?
The treasurer of a club manages all incoming and outgoing money: bank deposits, bill payments, cash counts from events, monthly financial reports to the board, and annual tax filings if the club has tax-exempt status. It's typically the most time-intensive volunteer officer role in a small club.
How much does it cost to file Form 990-N?
The 990-N itself has no IRS filing fee; it's free to submit through the IRS e-Postcard system. Costs only come up if you've fallen behind and need to apply for reinstatement after auto-revocation, which can involve an application fee; confirm the current amount directly with the IRS.
How long does a nonprofit have to file Form 990 each year?
The deadline is the 15th day of the 5th month after the organization's fiscal year ends. For a calendar-year nonprofit (fiscal year ending December 31), that means the return is due by May 15 of the following year, per IRS instructions.
What happens if a booster club never filed a 990?
If the club never applied for tax-exempt status, it may not owe a 990 at all, but it also can't tell donors their gifts are tax-deductible. If it has exempt status and simply never filed, it risks automatic revocation after three consecutive missed years under IRS rules. Confirm your club's exemption status with the IRS before assuming either way.
Does every small nonprofit have to file something with the IRS every year?
Yes, if it holds federal tax-exempt status. Even the smallest organizations with no filing requirement for income tax still generally must file at least the 990-N e-Postcard annually to maintain that status, per IRS guidance on annual exempt organization returns.
Sources
- IRS, Annual Electronic Filing Requirement for Small Exempt Organizations (Form 990-N): 990-N applies to organizations whose gross receipts are normally $50,000 or less, and what information it requires
- IRS, Automatic Revocation of Exemption: organizations that fail to file required returns for three consecutive years automatically lose tax-exempt status
- IRS, Annual Filing and Forms overview for exempt organizations: which 990 variant applies depends on gross receipts and total assets
- IRS, Instructions for Form 990 Return of Organization Exempt from Income Tax: annual return is due the 15th day of the 5th month after the fiscal year ends
- IRS, About Form 990, Return of Organization Exempt from Income Tax: Form 990 provides the IRS the information required under Internal Revenue Code section 6033
- IRS, Which Forms Do Exempt Organizations File: gross receipts and asset thresholds distinguishing 990-N, 990-EZ, full 990, and 990-PF filers