Guides: BUS 3315: Business Communications: Non-profit information

Form 990 - Who files one?

While a nonprofit's form 990 is a good place to gather more information about an organization, not all nonprofits are required to file a form 990. The following are organizations that are not required to file a 990:

Small nonprofits with annual incomes of $25,000.00 or less
Faith-based organizations
Subsidiaries of other nonprofits
Nonprofits that are not in the system yet
Religious schools
Missions & missionary organizations
State institutions
Government corporations

Locating Form 990

990 Finder
The Foundation Center collects 990s, with a focus on grantmaking organizations. With the 990 Finder, you can access these forms for the last 3-5 years.
National Center for Charitable Statistics
The National Center for Charitable Statistics offers its Search 990 Images database, which can be searched by organization name, state, and EIN. (NCCS is the national repository of data on the U.S. nonprofit sector. Get quick facts & figures or build custom reports based on geographic focus, organization type, and more.
Economic Research Institute
Free search tool of more than 2 million Forms 990 and 990-PF for U.S. nonprofits. Records include organization's basic details. ERI collects, analyzes, and publishes information on nonprofit executive compensation.
Pro Publica Nonprofit Explorer
Find exempt organizations and see details like their executive compensation, revenue and expenses, as well as download their tax filings going back as far as 2001
IRS - Form 990-N search
From the iRS, this allows you to search for organizations which file form 990-N (e Postcard) instead of a regular form 990.

Articles on Nonprofit organizations

Academic search complete This link opens in a new window
Offers indexing and abstracts for journals in all academic subjects.
Access world news This link opens in a new window
Provides access to news publications from across the world, including major national and international newspapers, as well as local and regional titles.
Business Source Complete This link opens in a new window
Provides access to full-text business journals and scholarly, peer-reviewed journals.
Nexis Uni This link opens in a new window
Provides access to resources for researching news, business, industry, and legal topics.

Sources for information

Charities and nonprofits can be challenging to find information on as they are "neither fish nor fowl". While they may operate as companies, they are not traded publically on the stock market and file few SEC forms to leave a paper trail for researchers to follow. The resources listed below are some of the places to look for information on these groups.

Charity Navigator
This resource allows user to search for charities and nonprofits.
Evaluating charities
Use this as a guideline to evaluating charities not on Charity Navigator or Guidestar.
Foundation Center - 990 finder
This resource allows users to search for 990 forms which have been filed by charities and nonprofits.
Guidestar
Use the Search GuideStar box to look for information on your charity/nonprofit.
How to check out your charity
Look at your charity before you get started.... or give.
How to read the IRS form 990 and find out what it means
This helps to explain the form 990 and what information a researcher can obtain from it.
National Center for Charitable Statistics
The National Center for Charitable Statistics (NCCS) is the national repository of data on the nonprofit sector in the United States. Its mission is to develop and disseminate high quality data on nonprofit organizations and their activities.
Volunteering and Civic Life in America
Volunteering and Civic Life in America presents data and other useful information on civic engagement in America. Some data by state and demographic group is available.
Volunteering in the Untied States - BLS
Information from the Bureau of Labor Statistics on volunteering in the United States.

BUS 3315: Business Communications

Demographic Information

Form 990 - Who files one?

Locating Form 990

Articles on Nonprofit organizations

Sources for information

University Libraries