Does your nonprofit group ever receive donations in the form of actual cash (the green stuff), for example, when you pass the hat at an event, or put out a collection box? If so, you need to know about certain changes made by the Pension Protection Act of 2006. These changes don't affect your organization directly, but may result in more of your donors requesting receipts for their money.

Before this Act was passed, your donors didn't need to have a receipt or other objective proof of any charitable cash contributions under $250. However, Congress began to suspect that some donors were claiming more donations than they'd actually made.

Under the new law, donors can deduct only those monetary contributions, whether they're cash, checks, or made in some other form, that can be substantiated by either a bank record or a written receipt (a letter will do) from the organization that received the money.

The upshot is that you may be seeing a lot more checks in your collection box. However, some donors who give you cash may ask for or expect a receipt, and other donors whose banks don't provide records of cancelled checks may do the same.

Perhaps you were already sending thank-you letters for all gifts anyway, as part of fostering good donor relations. If so, just make sure the letters state the gift amount. If not, now might be a good time to start (to the extent you can trace people's cash gifts). After all, tax deductions do provide at least a small part of people's motivation for giving. (And by the way, your organization is still obligated, under the law, to provide receipts for all gifts of $250 or more.)