Using a Logo and Signature bitmap on your Receipts

Adding your Logo to the Receipts

If you have an organizational logo, you may be able to add it to the program's built in receipts. There are some limitations to this capability. (If you choose to generate receipts with Mail Merge, you can do pretty much anything you want in terms of your logo.)

Basically, if you have or create a bitmap file named logo.bmp, with width 150 pixels and height 60 pixels, you can put it into the program directory (usually c:\Program Files\Donation). If it's there, it prints in the top right corner of the receipt. If there is no such file, it will still print fine.

Unless you are printing on a colour printer, this will probably look best if your bitmap is all black-and-white, or what most paint programs call two-colour or monochrome.

Also, if you provide a bitmap whose size is a multiple of 150 x 60, e.g. 300 x 120, 450 X 180 or 600 x 240, it will be automatically scaled to fit into the desired space (and may even look better on your printer). If your logo is not that shape, try to fit it into the bottom (if it is wider and less high) or right side (if it is squarer) of the space provided, as it will line up with the other elements on the receipt better that way.

The same logo file is automatically included in the sample mail merge receipts. However, it is not scaled to any given size - it will show up at whatever size the file actually is. You can also edit the sample mail merge receipt, to remove that logo file and insert a different one (of any size and shape) in its place, or in a different position in the receipt.

The same logo file can also optionally be included on envelopes that you print for donors or receipts.

Using a Bitmap Signature on the Receipts

You can also use a bitmap for the signing officer's signature. It should be put into the program directory as well, and be called signatur.bmp. It must be 166 x 39 pixels, or a multiple of that size, e.g. 332 x 78, 498 x 117 or 664 x 156. If such a file is in the directory, it will be used. If not, the space will be blank for a hand-written signature as usual.

The same bitmap signature file is also included in the sample mail merge receipts. However, as with the logo, it is not scaled to any given size - it will show up at whatever size the file actually is.

Some users may wish to use a password to govern the generation of receipts, since having the bitmap signature there makes it more of a one-person job that is less desirable from an audit perspective. To set up such a password, use Maintenance à Change Password à Receipt Password.

Problems Copying files in Vista or Windows 7 or Later

In these versions of windows, which have the User Account Control, Windows may not let you copy files into the DONATION installation folder (usually C:\Program Files\Donation), with a message like "You don't have permission to save in this location."

To get around that, go to Start, Programs, Accessories. Under that, you will see Windows Explorer in the list of available programs. Right-click on that, then pick "Run as Administrator" from the popup menu. This is now like Computer or My Computer, but it should let you copy any file (such as the bitmap files for the logo or signature) into that desired folder.

Warning about using Bitmap Signatures for Canadian Users

The Canada Revenue Agency, on a web page about Computer-generated Receipts, has some regulations about doing this, which DONATION will not satisfy in most cases. (What they call "facsimile signatures" include bitmap signatures, as used in DONATION, and rubber stamp signatures.) So you may need to decide whether you wish to use this capability in DONATION. Here is what that page says, as of July 2009:
 

Can receipts be issued with facsimile signatures?

A facsimile signature can be used under the following conditions:

Having said that, these regulations are inconsistent with their regulations for emailed receipts, which clearly require a facsimile signature, but cannot possibly satisfy the regulations above. The CRA is aware of this inconsistency, and may address it in the future. For obvious reasons the people I talked to at the CRA could not tell me that they would not enforce the above regulations, even though they are inconsistent. However, I personally think it's probably fair to assume that even if the CRA became aware that a charity was violating these regulations, they would not apply a severe punishment, but rather just ask for future compliance. But as I say, you need to make your own decision about this.

Training Video

There is a training video on Using a Logo and Signature bitmap on your Receipts on the Demos and Samples web page, if you would prefer to see this feature demonstrated live, rather than just reading about it. This might be particularly helpful if you have no idea how to go about creating graphics files with the correct dimensions, because it gives a quick introduction to doing that using the Windows Paint program.

What if my Logo or Signature isn't showing up?

One thing that has gone wrong for some users is that they inadvertently named their logo file "logo.bmp.bmp" or their signature file "signatur.bmp.bmp", and didn't notice it because Windows defaults to omitting the extension on commonly-used file types (the final ".bmp" in those names).

To check this, use My Computer or Windows Explorer, and navigate to C:\Program Files\Donation. You should see the file "logo.bmp" there. Do you also see a file named "donation.exe"? If not, you have this problem.

To fix it, in that window go to Tools à Folder Options, switch to the View tab, and in the Advanced Settings area, make sure that "Hide extensions for known file types" is not checked. (If it was already not checked, you didn't have this problem.) If it was checked, click it to uncheck it, then click OK. You should now see both "donation.exe" and "logo.bmp.bmp" and/or "signatur.bmp.bmp". To fix the name of the logo file, right-click on its name, and pick Rename from the popup menu. Delete the final ".bmp", leaving just "logo.bmp", then press Enter to save the change. Do the similar thing for the signature file.

After that fix, run DONATION again, and try a sample receipt - you should see your logo on it! If you don't, please email me your logo.bmp file as an attachment, and I will check it out for you.

Logo Alternatives

The area for the bitmap logo on the built-in receipts is not particularly large, and one user wanted a much larger logo, and came up with an innovative solution. The following instructions are adapted from his notes to me on what he did.

His solution was to create "receipt printing paper" with a large watermark of their logo. Then he printed the receipts created by DONATION on the "receipt printing paper", in effect printing twice. Once to create the printing stock, then second to print the delivered receipt on the stock.

To create a watermark using Microsoft Word, in a blank document use Format à Background à Printed Watermark. Select the radio button for Picture Watermark, the use the Select Picture button and browse to select your logo (a large graphic file). Select a Scale that works for you. You may also want to select the Washout or Transparent option (which one you see depends on your version of Word). After saving those changes, you can use File à Page Setup à Margins to move the image around the document. (That part is pure trial and error.) Then just print multiple copies of that document.

Having said this, given the option to easily generate receipts using mail merge, which allows you to use any size logo, I'm not sure why you would bother with this approach.