GiveCampus allows you to manage refunds for donors via your fundraising administrative dashboard. While we make this super easy to manage on your own, it is really important to be aware of how refunds impact your subscription.
Refunds
How to Issue a Refund
Step 1: Head to your Online Giving dashboard > manage gifts.
Step 2: Find the gift you'd like to refund.
Step 3: Click the 'Refund' button in the Refund Column.
Step 4: Follow instructions to confirm refund!
Refunds and Your GiveCampus Subscription:
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Social Fundraising Subscription:
Refunded gifts still count towards your Social Fundraising subscription like any other gift. -
Giving Forms with Pre-Paid Payment Processing Bundle
Refunded gifts still count towards your Giving Forms payment processing bundle like any other gift. -
Giving Forms without Pre-Paid Payment Processing Bundle
Refunded gifts will be invoiced for payment processing fees on the refunded gift.
Refund FAQs:
Who can Issue a Refund?
Full GiveCampus admins can issue refunds. With the release of more granular permissions (coming early 2024), you’ll be able to further limit who is able to issue refunds.
When can a refund be issued?
A refund can be issued up to 6 months after the gift has been made.
How do refunds impact deposits from Stripe?
- If there are funds that are pending deposit into your bank account when the refund is issue, the refunded dollars will be ‘pulled’ from that pending deposit.
- If there are not funds pending deposit into your bank when the refund is issued, the refunded dollars will be debited from your bank account.
- Refunds will show on your deposit report with a donation ‘state’ of ‘Refunded’
How long does a refund take to appear in a donors account?
If the gift was processed via Stripe (credit cards, Apple Pay, Google Pay, bank transfer) it can take up to 15 business days. Gifts processed via PayPal (PayPal and Venmo) it will be refunded immediately.
How do refunds impact deposits from PayPal?
- For gifts processed through PayPal, PayPal will let you run a negative balance until you have amassed enough gifts to cover the refund. Once the amount has been given through PayPal/Venmo to cover the refund, you will start receiving deposits from PayPal again.
- While you are amassing enough funds to cover the refund, you will still see PayPal/Venmo gifts in your donation reports and via the Gift API, but those gifts will not show in deposit reports.
Why does my institution still pay for refunded gifts?
GiveCampus incurs fees for processing transactions, even when those gifts are refunded or charged back. As noted in our terms of service, those fees are passed along to each school.
What does the contract say?
Refunds and Chargebacks in Section 2.7 of our Terms and Conditions.
In the event that a Donation or other payment is cancelled, reversed, charged back, or refunded after the transfer of such Donation or payment to Client, Client acknowledges and agrees that the amount of such Donation or payment will be debited from Client’s applicable account balance(s) with GiveCampus and the Payment Processor(s). Client further agrees to reimburse GiveCampus for any fees it may incur as a result of any such cancellations, reversals, chargebacks, or refunds, and acknowledges that any transaction fee(s) (e.g., a GF Transaction Fee or SFP Transaction Fee) associated with the Donation or payment being cancelled, reversed, charged back, or refunded shall remain payable to GiveCampus (or, in the event that Client has prepaid for payment processing, Client acknowledges that Donations and payments that are cancelled, reversed, charged back, or refunded may remain counted as part of the total amount specified in the applicable Subscription Level).
Is there a warning to remind me about fees associated with refunds?
Yes. Each time you issue a refund, the system will provide warnings to you, ask you to select a refund reason, and type ‘PROCESS REFUND’ in order to proceed. All of these steps are in place to ensure gifts are not refunded by accident.
Who gets notified about a refund?
The donor of the refunded gift will receive an email when their gift has been refunded. This email cannot currently be customized. Standard email content below:
Dear <<NAME>>,
We are emailing you to confirm that your $<<GIFT AMOUNT>> donation to <<SCHOOL NAME>> has been refunded. If you would still like to make a donation, click here [LINKS TO FORM WHERE THE GIFT ORIGINATED]. Please email <<school contact email>> if you have any questions!
Best,
The <<School Name>> Team
What about test gifts?
We recommend making small, $1 test gifts and either refunding or just making that part of your philanthropy for the year!
What about matches and challenges that were set up incorrectly?
We do not recommend refunding these gifts. Here's what we recommend as an alternative:
- Reach out to support@givecampus.com.
- We will move the gift off of the campaign so it is no longer counting towards your campaign totals.
- You can then re-set up the matches or challenge correctly as an offline match/challenge.
Chargebacks
How is a chargeback different from a refund?
A chargeback occurs when a donor disputes the charge on their credit card directly with their credit card or bank (as opposed to reaching out to your school to ask for a refund). A charge back is different than a refund in that it is initiated by a donor (or a donor’s bank) when they mark a transaction as fraud. This can happen if a donor forgets they made a donation, or if there has been fraudulent activity outside of the intended donation.
What happens if a donor issues a chargeback on their gift?
- When a chargeback occurs, Stripe immediately withdraws the donation amount, a $15 chargeback fee, and the processing fee from GiveCampus’s bank account. We immediately dispute this charge on your behalf - submitting all the evidence we have of the donation.
- GiveCampus will notify you of the charge back and immediately submit all of the information necessary to dispute the charge back.
What should we do if we receive notification of a chargeback?
The best course of action we recommend is to have the donor complete the following steps:
- Contact their credit card company and tell them that they want to drop the dispute.
- Provide us with a statement (via email) saying that they will withdraw the dispute, which we will then submit as additional evidence for the dispute.
What happens after the dispute has been submitted?
The dispute itself can take up to 90 days before a decision is finalized. However, there are two outcomes that may occur: either you will win or lose the dispute.
- If you win the challenge, the donation remains in your deposit and you are not assessed the $15 fee.
- If you lose the challenge, the donation will be removed from either a pending Stripe Deposit, or if no funds are available in your bank account in which deposits are made from Stripe, GiveCampus will cover the $15 chargeback fee but you will still be invoiced the payment processing fees on the disputed gifts.
The donor’s bank makes the ultimate decision about how to resolve the dispute/challenge, and we do not have any specific information about how this review process works. We do see that these disputes are difficult to “win” and that is why we work to get these disputed as soon as possible with all evidence provided.