The annual meeting voted in June. A new president, a new treasurer, a new secretary. In September the new treasurer opens the organization’s Gmail to answer membership questions, and Google asks her to confirm the sign-in on a phone. The phone belongs to the old president, who moved across the country and answers messages on Sundays, sometimes.
A board transition is two jobs. The first is paperwork: whatever your regulator needs to know. It is short and well documented. The second is access: the email account, the bank, the payment platform, the website, the social pages. Nobody writes that one into the bylaws, and it is the one that stops the organization three months later. This checklist covers both.
What you may have to file, and with whom
This depends entirely on where your organization is registered, and sometimes on its legal form. We will not pretend there is one rule. Three examples we checked, and a pointer for everyone else:
- United States. At the federal level, the IRS asks you to file Form 8822-B if the identity of your responsible party changes, the person named for your EIN, and to do it within 60 days. A new board does not always mean a new responsible party, so check who is named before filing. State rules for nonprofit corporations and charities vary: check with your state’s corporations office or charity regulator.
- England and Wales. The Charity Commission asks registered charities to keep trustee details up to date: remove a trustee’s details when they stop being a trustee, add the new one’s. Only trustees’ names appear on the public register.
- France. A declared association has 3 months to declare new officers to the associations registry, online through the e-Modification service or by post. Our French version of this article covers the French procedure in detail.
- Anywhere else. Look up your national or regional charity or nonprofit regulator, and read your own bylaws: they say who elects the officers and what record of the vote you need to keep.
Whatever the rule, keep the minutes of the meeting that elected the new board (usually the secretary’s job) and the updated list of officers somewhere the next board can find them. Banks and platforms may ask for them.
The bank: signers, cards, delegations
Signing authority does not update itself when the board changes. Until the bank has removed them, assume the outgoing signers can still sign.
- Book a meeting with the bank, with the minutes of the election and the updated officer list.
- Remove outgoing signers and add the new ones.
- Cancel the outgoing officers’ cards and order cards for the new ones.
- Change the online banking access. If the login belongs to the previous treasurer, it leaves with them.
The shared email account, the one everyone forgets
In most small nonprofits the address is a free Gmail or Outlook.com account created years ago by a president or secretary. The password travels by text message. The recovery phone number is the creator’s. It all works, until that person leaves the board.
In practice, whoever holds the recovery phone and email is the one who controls the account. With a Google account, three facts from Google’s help pages (as observed in September 2026) mean you have to act before that person leaves:
- Sign-in prompts go to their phone. Google can ask you to tap a notification to confirm a sign-in even without 2-Step Verification, and those prompts go to any Android phone signed in to the account. A sign-in that looks different, from another location for example, may also require extra steps to confirm it’s you: that is a new volunteer.
- Recovery info can only be changed from inside. You cannot add recovery info while you are locked out, and after a change Google may keep sending codes to the previous recovery info for 7 days.
- Backup codes can be renewed. With 2-Step Verification on, creating a new set of 10 backup codes makes the old set inactive, including the codes the outgoing board wrote down.
In one sitting with the outgoing officer: replace the recovery phone and email with ones the organization owns (or at least a new board member’s), change the password, regenerate the backup codes and store them with the organization’s records. The step-by-step version, with delegation so the password stops travelling, is in sharing a nonprofit Gmail account between volunteers.
Better still, stop sharing the password at all. Each person on their own login means a departure is one access removed, not a password to change for everyone. For the email side of the handover (what to pass on, how to keep the history), see our volunteer email handover guide. For options that avoid a shared password, read share a mailbox without sharing the password and the limits of Gmail delegation. If the address needs rebuilding on a proper footing, create a nonprofit email address compares the options.
Payment platforms, website, domain, social accounts
Payment and donation platforms. Check which address each platform sends its password resets to. If it is the organization’s email address, securing that account first protects this one too: the email account is the key to most of the others. If nobody knows who opened the account, expect the platform’s support to ask for proof that you now run the organization, such as the officer list or the minutes of the last meeting. Add the new officers as administrators while the old ones are still around.
The website and the domain. Two separate logins, often both forgotten: the registrar that holds the domain name, and the host or site builder. Check whose name the domain is registered in and which address receives the renewal notices. A domain that lapses because the reminders go to the old webmaster takes the organization’s email address down with it. If your addresses run on Google Workspace, the admin console is one more login: name at least two administrators, as our Google Workspace for Nonprofits guide explains.
Social media pages. Add the new admins before removing the old ones, never the other way round. If the page hangs off an outgoing officer’s personal account, this is the moment to name at least two admins from the new board.
Everything else. The insurer, the umbrella organization, the venue booking system, the accounting software, the shared drive. Write the list once: it will serve every board change after this one.
The board change checklist
Before the outgoing officers leave:
- List every account the organization uses: email, online banking, payment platform, domain, hosting, social pages, insurance, umbrella body.
- For the email account: change the recovery phone and email, regenerate backup codes, change the password.
- Add the new officers as administrators everywhere you can, before removing the old ones.
- Collect the keys, the checkbook, the receipt books and the paper files.
After the election:
- File whatever your regulator requires, within its deadline, with the minutes and the officer list.
- Visit the bank: signers, cards, online access.
- Remove the outgoing officers’ access and sign them out of their devices. For the contact mailbox, see reset your nonprofit’s contact mailbox.
- Update the list of accounts and store it with your bylaws.
To tell the bank, partners or members, a short message is enough:
Hello,
At its annual meeting on June 14, 2026, Friends of the Mill elected a new board: Claire Martin, president, Karim Benali, treasurer, and Sophie Roux, secretary.
The minutes and the updated list of officers are attached.
Please update your records. The organization’s email address stays the same.
Best regards,
Claire Martin, President
More ready-to-use messages (dues, volunteers, memberships) are in our nonprofit email templates.
When several board members answer email
Everything above works without any particular tool. But if three board members read the same address, every handover is still a password to pass around, and every week is a guess about who answered whom.
Trupeo connects to the address you already have, at Gmail, Outlook, Microsoft 365 or any IMAP provider, and each volunteer signs in with their own account. Every message has an owner and a status, internal notes stay next to the message, and you see when someone is already drafting a reply. When the board changes, you remove one access and add another: the history stays. If you stop using Trupeo, the address keeps working at its provider.
It costs €10 per connected mailbox per month, excluding VAT, for two people, and €20 from three. Verified associations and schools get 50% off: €5 and €10. See our non-profits page and pricing.
Frequently asked questions
Do we have to file anything when nonprofit officers change?
It depends on the country and sometimes the state. In the US, the IRS asks for Form 8822-B within 60 days if the EIN’s responsible party changes, and state rules vary. In England and Wales, registered charities update their trustee details with the Charity Commission. In France, a declared association has 3 months to declare new officers. Elsewhere, check your charity or nonprofit regulator.
What should the outgoing president hand over?
Every login the organization depends on, with the recovery methods moved to the new board: the email account first, then online banking, payment platforms, the domain and hosting, and the social pages. Plus the physical items: keys, checkbook, receipt books and records.
How do we take over the nonprofit’s Gmail account when the creator left?
If you can still reach them, do the handover together: new recovery phone and email, new password, new backup codes. If not, use Google’s account recovery, which asks questions to check the account is yours and works best from a device and a place where the account usually signs in. That is rarely true for a new board, which is why the handover should happen before the departure.
Should the new board share one password?
It is the common setup and the fragile one. Each departure means changing the password for everyone, sign-in prompts land on one person’s phone, and nobody knows who answered what. Give each person their own access, through delegation or a shared inbox tool, so a departure is one access removed.
Sources:
- IRS: About Form 8822-B, Change of Address or Responsible Party, Business: the form to report a change in the identity of the responsible party, and the 60-day deadline for reporting it.
- GOV.UK, Charity Commission: How to update your charity’s details: applies to England and Wales; remove a trustee’s details when they stop being a trustee and add new trustees, with only trustees’ names shown on the public register.
- Service-public.fr: Changements dans l’administration d’une association (in French): the 3-month deadline for declaring new officers of a French association, online, by post or in person.
- Service-public.fr: Modification d’une association (e-modification) (in French): the online service for declaring changes in an association’s administration.
- Google Account Help: Sign in with Google prompts: as observed in September 2026, sign-in prompts that Google may show even without 2-Step Verification, sent to any Android phone signed in to the account, and extra steps when a sign-in looks different, like its location.
- Google Account Help: Set up recovery options: as observed in September 2026, codes that may go to previous recovery info for 7 days, and recovery info that cannot be added while locked out.
- Google Account Help: Sign in with backup codes: as observed in September 2026, a new set of 10 backup codes makes the old set inactive.
- Google Account Help: How to recover your Google Account or Gmail and Tips to complete account recovery steps: as observed in September 2026, the recovery questions and the advice to use a familiar device and location.