Benchmark report 2026
The nonprofit control benchmark
Inside the approval controls of 250 nonprofits in the US and Canada.
Benchmark report 2026
Inside the approval controls of 250 nonprofits in the US and Canada.
The report looks at how nonprofit finance teams in the US and Canada have their approvals configured, and at how those approvals are then used month to month. It covers approval thresholds, budget checking, restricted fund handling and board involvement, setting the sector against comparison groups in other industries.
It's a study of how approvals are set up and used inside ApprovalMax, not a review of anyone's accounting records.
Six areas of approval control, with the figures behind each one and how they shift with the size and type of organization.
Approval thresholds
How many people sign off a bill, whether that number rises with the value of the bill, and what happens in organizations that have never set a threshold.
Budget checks
The four ways to check a bill against a budget at the point of approval, and how many of the 250 organizations use any of them.
Who approves what
How the approver changes with the type of nonprofit, and why a congregation and a grant-making foundation sit at opposite ends of the same sector.
The sector in context
How nonprofit approval controls compare with a much larger group of construction firms, and where the sector is stronger than its reputation suggests.
Restricted funds
How widely fund structure is held, how often bills are coded to it, and how rarely it is used to decide who approves.
Board involvement
How often a board member actually appears as an approver on a bill, set against the governance role boards are given on paper.
The single audit threshold, repeat audit findings, funder due diligence, and what Form 990 Part VI asks you to state in public.
Figures from the ACFE 2026 report, set against what the approval data shows about how nonprofits actually work.
Five steps to deeper control, in the order the data suggests organizations tend to take them.
A month-end checklist for your own approvals, written to be used on its own without the rest of the report.
This is a study of how approvals are set up and used inside ApprovalMax.
“ApprovalMax lends that level of control and accountability to give us documentation in black and white, through the audit trail, that we can show an auditor.”
Stephanie Cooper, Controller at CHARITYacCOUNTS!
30+ staff supporting 60+ North American charities
Download the benchmark report, then use the eight-question checklist at the back on your own month end.
