Grants paid in US dollars or euros

What a non-profit's books in Achekam can and cannot do with a grant paid in dollars or euros, and how to record the converted amount yourself.

By Achekam · 11 October 2026 · 5 min read · For Non-profit businesses in South Africa, Nigeria, Kenya

International foundations, embassies and development agencies rarely pay in rand, naira or shillings. The grant agreement is written in US dollars, euros or pounds, the money lands in a foreign currency account, and some weeks later part of it is converted to pay salaries and suppliers at home. Somewhere in that journey, the amount in your books and the amount in the funder's report start to drift apart.

That drift is not an error. It is what happens when one grant lives in two currencies. But unless your organisation decides in advance how to record it, every report becomes an argument about which rate was used and why the figures do not agree.

This article sets out what Achekam's books do with foreign currency today, what you have to handle yourself, and a method to agree with your accountant before the next tranche arrives.

Where the books assume one currency today

Be clear about the limits first, because they shape everything else.

Invoices. Neither invoice form lets you invoice in another currency. If a funder asks for a claim or invoice in dollars, prepare it as a separate document rather than through the invoice forms, and record what arrives in the books yourself.
The ledger. Your ledger works in one currency. For a South African organisation that is the rand. For a Nigerian or Kenyan organisation there is a further limit at the time of writing: the ledger screens show every amount in rand and the chart of accounts is stored in ZAR, even though the organisation works in naira or shillings. Raise this with your accountant before you rely on printed ledger reports, and make sure everyone reading them knows which currency the figures really represent.

In short, treat each conversion as a decision your organisation makes and records itself.

One currency for each bank account

Each bank account takes one currency. A dollar account and a local current account are two accounts, never one account holding two currencies.

That is a helpful discipline. Keep the grant's foreign currency account separate from your operating account, and resist the temptation to let a funder pay into whichever account is convenient. A clean dollar account whose only movements are grant receipts and conversions is far easier to report on than one mixed with other income.

Bringing the foreign account's statement in

Import the foreign account's statements as you would any other. Achekam accepts PDF, CSV, Excel, OFX, QIF, MT940 or CAMT.053 files, and each import is checked so that the opening balance plus the movements equals the closing balance.

That check is worth having even though the amounts are in another currency. It tells you the statement is complete: no page missing, no line dropped. When a funder or auditor later asks for every movement on the grant account, you can show the imported statements and know nothing is left out. File the bank's conversion advices and the funder's remittance notices in Document Centre, in a folder per grant, so the evidence for each rate sits beside the statement it explains.

Recording the converted amount by journal

Because the ledger keeps one currency, the grant enters your books as a converted amount, posted by manual journal. Achekam refuses an unbalanced journal or one dated in a closed month, and a posted journal is corrected only by reversal, so get the rate right before you post.

A worked example in words:

The tranche arrives. A foundation pays the first tranche in dollars into your dollar account. You post a journal on the date it arrived: debit the ledger account you keep for the dollar bank account, credit the grant's income or deferred grant account, using the amount converted at your agreed rate. Write the rate and its source in the journal's description.
Part of it is converted. Some weeks later you convert part of the balance to local currency. Your local bank account receives the actual converted amount. You post a journal moving that value out of the dollar bank account and into the local bank account.
The difference. The value you take out of the dollar account, at the rate you used on arrival, will rarely equal what the local account actually received. The difference goes to an exchange differences account, which you can add to your chart. Accounts can be added, renamed or switched off, so create it once and use it for every grant.
Month end. If dollars remain unconverted at month end or year end, ask your accountant whether that balance should be restated at a closing rate, and post that adjustment by journal too.

If the funder requires its grant to be kept apart from others, give each grant its own income or deferred account and its own exchange differences line; see keeping restricted funds apart in your chart of accounts.

Agreeing an exchange-rate method with your accountant

The biggest source of trouble is not the arithmetic but inconsistency: one rate in March, a different kind of rate in April, and a third in the funder report. Agree a method once and write it in your finance procedures.

Questions to settle:

Which rate on arrival? The bank's rate on the day the money arrived, an official published rate, or another rate your accountant recommends.
Which rate for the funder? Many funders specify the rate they want used in reports, often the rate actually achieved on conversion. Read the agreement; it may differ from what your financial statements use.
Who records the rate? One person posts the journals, keeps the source and files the bank advice.
What happens at year end? Whether unconverted foreign balances are restated, and where gains and losses are shown.

The IFRS Foundation's summary of IAS 21 on foreign exchange rates explains how the standard requires foreign currency transactions to be accounted for. Your accountant will tell you which framework your organisation reports under and how its rules apply to grants.

Before the next tranche lands

Write down the rate method, set up the separate bank account and the exchange differences account, and agree who posts the journals. When the tranche itself arrives without any invoice, recording a grant tranche that arrives in the bank walks through the posting from the bank line.

A grant that is converted the same way every time produces reports a funder can follow, and that is worth an hour's conversation with your accountant now.

General guidance only, not advice on your own circumstances. Tax and payroll rules change: check the current position with the authority or your adviser.