Not only is recurring giving the most sustainable way for donors to support your institution, it's also easy to set up! Donors can make recurring gifts to your school monthly, yearly, and now, indefinitely! By allowing donors to give indefinite recurring gifts on a Social Fundraising campaign or GC Giving Forms, you're providing your donors the ability and ease of sustained giving. Here’s what you need to know in order to utilize indefinite recurring gifts on GiveCampus. To learn more about the power of the subscription economy, click here.
Turning it on:
Indefinite recurring is enabled by default when you launch a campaign or create a Giving Form. If you’d like to modify an existing campaign to include indefinite recurring you’ll want to head to Campaign Settings > Giving Form > scroll to “Recurring” section > and select “Indefinitely” in the ‘Recurring Gift Frequency’ section. To add to an existing Giving Form head to Admin Dashboard > Giving Forms > Settings for the form you’d like to modify > Giving Form > scroll to “Recurring” section > and select “Indefinitely” in the ‘Recurring Gift Frequency' section.
Heads up! Indefinite recurring gifts do work a little bit differently than time-bound recurring gifts. Below, we have some answers to FAQs so that you can proceed with confidence!
FAQs - Indefinite Recurring Giving
Q: Can we add an end date to a gift that was set up as an indefinitely recurring gift?
A: Yes. Just write into support@givecampus.com if you have a donor who would like to add an end date to their recurring gift.
Q: Can a donor pause their indefinite recurring gift?
A: A donor can’t completely ‘pause’ their recurring gift. However, both you and the donor have the ability to modify the run date of the gift, effectively pushing back the charge date. The donor can either do this in their profile on GiveCampus, or if they don’t have a profile, by visiting their original gift notification email and click on ‘Manage Recurring Gift’. As an admin, you can edit the run date by heading to your admin dashboard > manage gifts > recurring subscriptions > search donation ID or donor name > click on the hyperlinked Donation ID > Update Run Date. Note: the new run date can’t be more than a year away.
Q: Can I change the designation of indefinitely recurring gifts?
A: Yes. To change the designation of the gift you’ll want to visit the 'Manage Gifts' section of your administrator dashboard, then enter donation ID or donor name, select the Donation ID, and scroll to the Designation section. Here there is a drop down of designations that appeared on your giving form. If multiple designations were available on the campaign or giving form, you can move the donation to a different designation within that campaign/form.
Q: Can my donor cancel their indefinitely recurring gift themselves?
A: No. The donor will need to contact your school directly to cancel their gift. Read more here to learn what else you can modify as an administrator.
Q: How does a donor’s indefinite recurring gift add into my campaign totals?
A: Unlike time-bound recurring gifts, if a donor sets up an indefinite recurring gift, only the first installment of the recurring gift will count towards:
Turning it on:
Indefinite recurring is enabled by default when you launch a campaign or create a Giving Form. If you’d like to modify an existing campaign to include indefinite recurring you’ll want to head to Campaign Settings > Giving Form > scroll to “Recurring” section > and select “Indefinitely” in the ‘Recurring Gift Frequency’ section. To add to an existing Giving Form head to Admin Dashboard > Giving Forms > Settings for the form you’d like to modify > Giving Form > scroll to “Recurring” section > and select “Indefinitely” in the ‘Recurring Gift Frequency' section.
Heads up! Indefinite recurring gifts do work a little bit differently than time-bound recurring gifts. Below, we have some answers to FAQs so that you can proceed with confidence!
FAQs - Indefinite Recurring Giving
Q: Can we add an end date to a gift that was set up as an indefinitely recurring gift?
A: Yes. Just write into support@givecampus.com if you have a donor who would like to add an end date to their recurring gift.
Q: Can a donor pause their indefinite recurring gift?
A: A donor can’t completely ‘pause’ their recurring gift. However, both you and the donor have the ability to modify the run date of the gift, effectively pushing back the charge date. The donor can either do this in their profile on GiveCampus, or if they don’t have a profile, by visiting their original gift notification email and click on ‘Manage Recurring Gift’. As an admin, you can edit the run date by heading to your admin dashboard > manage gifts > recurring subscriptions > search donation ID or donor name > click on the hyperlinked Donation ID > Update Run Date. Note: the new run date can’t be more than a year away.
Q: Can I change the designation of indefinitely recurring gifts?
A: Yes. To change the designation of the gift you’ll want to visit the 'Manage Gifts' section of your administrator dashboard, then enter donation ID or donor name, select the Donation ID, and scroll to the Designation section. Here there is a drop down of designations that appeared on your giving form. If multiple designations were available on the campaign or giving form, you can move the donation to a different designation within that campaign/form.
Q: Can my donor cancel their indefinitely recurring gift themselves?
A: No. The donor will need to contact your school directly to cancel their gift. Read more here to learn what else you can modify as an administrator.
Q: How does a donor’s indefinite recurring gift add into my campaign totals?
A: Unlike time-bound recurring gifts, if a donor sets up an indefinite recurring gift, only the first installment of the recurring gift will count towards:
- Campaign Totals
- Leaderboard Counts
- Matches/Challenges
- Incentives
We count indefinite recurring gifts this way because we can’t predict the lifetime value of a gift that could go on forever. If you would like to include more of the donor’s gift in your campaign, you can add an additional quantity as an offline gift.
The only exception may be that, if the campaign runs for a long period of time where multiple installments from an indefinite recurring gift occur, each installment will be added to your campaign dollar total as the installments transact. EX: A campaign runs for 6 months and a donor set up a $10/mo indefinite recurring gift on the first day of the campaign. The recurring gift will transact 6 times during the life of the campaign and $60 will accrue to the campaign total.
Q: What happens if a donor’s credit card information changes?
A: Donors have the ability to update certain details of their payment method for their recurring gift on their own. We will attempt to automatically update credit card information without any intervention from your donor, and in the majority of cases can do so if a card is still related to the same bank account. You can learn more about what the donor can update about their gift, and what you can do as an administrator in this article.
Q: Can a donor change their payment method?
A: Donors can add, remove, and update their payment information in their GiveCampus profiles. To get there, have your donor sign in > Click in the upper right where it says “Hi, [NAME]!” > Profile > Wallet. Here, the donor can add, remove, and modify credit cards and bank accounts.
If your donor does not have an account with GiveCampus they can manage their recurring gift by going to their original confirmation email for their recurring gift and selecting “Manage Subscription”.
Q: How do indefinitely recurring gifts affect my annual GiveCampus fundraising allowance?
A: Only installments that are charged during the subscription year will be counted toward your school’s annual fundraising allowance but they are important to factor in each time you renew with GiveCampus to ensure you have enough subscription to cover your donor activity.
For additional questions about indefinite recurring please write to support@givecampus.com!
The only exception may be that, if the campaign runs for a long period of time where multiple installments from an indefinite recurring gift occur, each installment will be added to your campaign dollar total as the installments transact. EX: A campaign runs for 6 months and a donor set up a $10/mo indefinite recurring gift on the first day of the campaign. The recurring gift will transact 6 times during the life of the campaign and $60 will accrue to the campaign total.
Q: What happens if a donor’s credit card information changes?
A: Donors have the ability to update certain details of their payment method for their recurring gift on their own. We will attempt to automatically update credit card information without any intervention from your donor, and in the majority of cases can do so if a card is still related to the same bank account. You can learn more about what the donor can update about their gift, and what you can do as an administrator in this article.
Q: Can a donor change their payment method?
A: Donors can add, remove, and update their payment information in their GiveCampus profiles. To get there, have your donor sign in > Click in the upper right where it says “Hi, [NAME]!” > Profile > Wallet. Here, the donor can add, remove, and modify credit cards and bank accounts.
If your donor does not have an account with GiveCampus they can manage their recurring gift by going to their original confirmation email for their recurring gift and selecting “Manage Subscription”.
Q: How do indefinitely recurring gifts affect my annual GiveCampus fundraising allowance?
A: Only installments that are charged during the subscription year will be counted toward your school’s annual fundraising allowance but they are important to factor in each time you renew with GiveCampus to ensure you have enough subscription to cover your donor activity.
For additional questions about indefinite recurring please write to support@givecampus.com!