How to File Your Hawaii CSC Preliminary Report (2026 Guide)

If you are the treasurer for a Hawaii candidate committee or noncandidate committee in a 2026 election year, the Preliminary Report is the return that gets you into the primary-election window in good standing. It is the first of the year's deadline-driven filings, and — because the schedule reset after last general — it is also the point at which the Campaign Spending Commission (CSC) can see the first three or four months of your bookkeeping in one document.

The Commission publishes its guidance, forms, and Committee Reporting System (CRS) at ags.hawaii.gov/campaign. This guide walks the Preliminary Report from prep through submission with the intent of getting a first-time treasurer to an accepted filing in one pass. It is not a substitute for the CSC's own Candidate Committee Manual or for advice from your CPA when a question turns into a tax question.

What the Preliminary Report is

The Preliminary Report is one of the periodic reports required of every candidate committee and noncandidate committee registered with the CSC. Its job is to summarize contributions received, expenditures made, loans outstanding, and cash on hand for a defined reporting period ending shortly before the primary election. The reporting period, the due date, and the schedules are set by the Commission each election cycle; the pattern has been stable for several cycles, but the exact dates for 2026 are the ones the Commission publishes for 2026 — always verify against the Commission's current filing schedule.

Who files: any registered candidate committee in an election year, and any noncandidate committee that made expenditures or received contributions during the reporting period. If your committee has zero activity for the period you still file the report — the CSC treats a missed filing and a zero filing as very different things.

What you'll need before you file

Every schedule reconciles to a set of underlying records. If those records are complete before you open CRS, the filing takes ten minutes; if they are not, the report becomes a fishing expedition against your bank statements at 11:57 pm the night of the deadline. Assemble:

• Committee credentials. The treasurer's CRS login. Chair and treasurer are the two named officers on the Organizational Report; only the treasurer typically files the periodic reports.
• Bank statements covering the reporting period. One statement per campaign account. The starting balance on Day 1 of the report equals the ending cash-on-hand of the last accepted report — verify this before you begin.
• Every contribution record. Donor name, address (required for contributions that bring aggregate giving above the address threshold), employer and occupation for individual donors above the disclosure threshold, contribution date, amount, and form (cash, check, credit card, in-kind).
• Every expenditure record. Payee name and address, date, amount, purpose (in the Commission's coded categories), and — for expenditures above the itemization threshold — supporting documentation you can produce on request.
• Loan documents. The loan agreement, the identity of the lender, the interest rate, repayment terms, and running balances.
• Prior accepted reports. The last accepted report's cash-on-hand and cumulative totals are the opening figures for this one. If they disagree, this is the report where the discrepancy has to be resolved.

The 2026 filing calendar

Every candidate committee's schedule of periodic reports is published by the Commission for the election year. The Commission maintains a single filing calendar page under "Filing Schedule" at ags.hawaii.gov/campaign — treat that page as authoritative for exact due dates and reporting periods. Reports run on 11:59 pm Hawaii time on the due date; the CRS clock is what governs, not the treasurer's clock.

The Preliminary Report is one of the reports in a candidate's cycle. The other periodic reports that will follow in a 2026 primary-election year are typically a Primary Report (final report before the primary), a General Report (before the general election), a Final Election Period Report (post-general), and a Supplemental Report on a fixed calendar. The exact set depends on whether the committee is a candidate committee, a noncandidate committee, or a super-PAC-analogue, and on whether the candidate advances past the primary.

Schedule A: Contributions

Schedule A itemizes every contribution received during the reporting period. Contributions are reported as they were received, not as they cleared — a check dated the last day of the period is reported in that period even if it clears the bank two business days later.

The itemization threshold sets when an individual contribution has to be reported line-by-line as opposed to lumped into an aggregate total. For contributions that meet or exceed the threshold, you report the donor's name, mailing address, aggregate election-period total, employer and occupation (for individuals), contribution date, and amount. Contributions below the threshold can be reported in an aggregate roll-up, but the underlying records still have to exist and be produceable on request.

In-kind contributions — donated goods, services, or discounted rates — are contributions and are reported on Schedule A with a fair-market-value amount. The corresponding expenditure is not double- counted on Schedule B; the CRS handles the crossover if you enter it as in-kind on Schedule A.

Common Schedule A patterns that trip a review:

• Aggregate thresholds crossed mid-period. A donor who gave $70 in January and $50 in March has crossed the $100 aggregate threshold — the $50 March contribution has to be reported with full donor information because the aggregate is now $120. The CRS will not do this math for you; run the aggregate against every donor before you submit.
• Cash contributions above the cash limit. Hawaii caps cash contributions per donor per election period at $100 (verify against current CSC guidance for 2026). Cash gifts above the cap must be refunded or converted to a check by the donor.
• Anonymous contributions. Anonymous contributions are limited by rule; amounts over the cap must be transmitted to the Hawaii Election Campaign Fund. The CSC guidance covers this case; a common error is to keep the anonymous overage as a general contribution.

Schedule B: Expenditures

Schedule B itemizes every expenditure made during the reporting period. Payees are listed by legal name (not the doing-business-as name unless that is what the invoice carried), with a mailing address, date, amount, and coded purpose. Common purpose codes cover printing, postage, advertising, consulting, food/beverage for events, salaries and wages, contract labor, office supplies, rent, and bank/credit-card fees.

Two categories require particular care because they are the sources of the most Preliminary Report rework:

• Bank fees and merchant-processor fees. These are expenditures. They are recorded on Schedule B against the bank or processor as the payee. Treating them as an offset against a contribution is a common mistake; see the mistakes post for the fix.
• Refunds and returned items. A refunded contribution is not an expenditure — it is reported as a negative or offsetting entry to the original contribution on Schedule A. Reporting a contribution refund as an expenditure double-counts the flow and breaks the cash-on-hand reconciliation.

Schedule C: Loans

Schedule C reports any loan to the committee — from the candidate, from an individual, or from a commercial lender — that is outstanding at any point during the reporting period. The lender's name and address, the original loan amount, the interest rate, the outstanding balance at the start of the period, additions or repayments during the period, and the outstanding balance at the end are all reported.

Candidate loans to the campaign are common in Hawaii races and are permitted. They are still loans and are still reported on Schedule C — not as contributions on Schedule A. A candidate who has forgiven the loan (converted it to a contribution) reports the forgiveness in the period it happened, and the loan closes.

Common mistakes and how to avoid them

Reviewing patterns visible in publicly-posted CSC advisory opinions and enforcement actions, the avoidable Preliminary Report errors cluster in five buckets.

1. Missing donor address on aggregated contributions

A single $75 contribution does not require a donor address. Once the donor's aggregate reaches the address-required threshold, every contribution from that donor for the election period needs to be re-attributed with the address. The mid-period crossover is the case that catches treasurers off guard because CRS does not walk backward through prior submissions on your behalf.

2. Bank fees miscategorized

Merchant-processor fees and bank fees are Schedule B expenditures, payable to the bank / processor, with a "Bank Fees" purpose code. Netting them against the contribution amount produces contribution figures that don't match the deposit and cash-on-hand that doesn't reconcile.

3. Cash-on-hand doesn't match the bank

The CRS asks for the ending cash-on-hand figure and computes what it should be from your Schedule A + Schedule B + Schedule C entries. If the number the CRS calculates disagrees with the number you typed in, the report is rejected. Reconcile against your bank statement before you submit — the outstanding-checks difference is a common source of the mismatch, not an error.

4. Purpose codes that don't match the invoice

"Consulting" is the most abused purpose code. If you paid a printer, the purpose is "Printing." If you paid a caterer, it's "Food/Beverage." A downstream review that pulls the payee's public information and finds a printing shop coded as "Consulting" is the origin of most requests for follow-up documentation.

5. Submitting on the deadline

The CRS accepts filings up to 11:59 pm Hawaii time on the due date, but the last two hours are the period during which the system is under the most load and treasurers discover open reconciliation issues. File 24 hours early. If the system does reject the submission, you want the response back during business hours, not overnight.

What happens after you file

Accepted filings appear in the CSC's public search within a business day. The report is immediately public, which means individual contributors and expenditures are visible to reporters, opponents, and the general public. That is the design of the system — contribution transparency is the point.

The Commission reviews filings and may issue a Notice of Additional Information Required or a Complaint if it identifies an issue. Responses are due within the timeframe the notice specifies, typically 20 days. The Commission can amend, reject, or accept the report on review.

Amendments are filed when the committee discovers an error in an accepted report. There is no penalty for a voluntary amendment; there is a penalty for a report the Commission had to reject and request corrections on. When you find an error in a filed report, file the amendment; do not wait for the next periodic report to fix it.

How OpenBooks helps

OpenBooks reconciles bank feeds against your recorded contributions and expenditures the day they settle, so the closing cash-on-hand figure is right by the time you open CRS. Every contribution over the aggregation threshold carries a donor-info completeness check, and expenditure purpose codes are suggested from the payee's public profile so "Consulting" doesn't hide a printer. The Preliminary Report itself is a one-click export from the running ledger — the treasurer signs and submits.

OpenBooks does not file for you and does not replace your CPA when a question turns into a tax question. It replaces the person who was going to spend three weekends in July reconciling bank statements against a spreadsheet.