Recurring plans

When a recurring plan is created by a supporter in a Checkout modal or Campaign Page, or by a user in the Virtual Terminal, records are created for two objects: a Donation object for the first single installment as well as a Recurring object for the recurring donation plan as a whole. If the supporter is new to your organization, a Supporter record will also be created.

For each subsequent installment charged as part of the recurring plan, another individual Donation record is created and linked to that recurring plan.

The Recurring record includes a summary of the recurring plan details, including its amount, frequency and payment method. The record also includes a log of all activity associated with the recurring plan, as well as emails sent to the donor.

When a recurring plan is created in the Checkout modal or Campaign Page, the start date of the plan is the date of the first donation. The date of the first installment of the plan and the date of the creation of the recurring plan are always the same.

In the Virtual Terminal, however, supporters can choose a start date in the future for their recurring plan. The payment information for the recurring plan is tokenized at the time the plan is created, but the charge occurs on the selected start date.

When an installment is due for a recurring plan, Fundraise Up attempts to charge the payment method associated with the recurring plan. If the charge fails, Fundraise Up retries the charge. The retry schedule is based on the frequency of the recurring plan. The schedule is described below.

If a recurring plan is configured using a bank-based payment method, such as ACH Direct Debit, Fundraise Up will only attempt to charge the account for the scheduled installment. No further retries are attempted to avoid bank fees for the supporter.

For each failed charge, Fundraise Up automatically sends the “Plan failed” email (if enabled) to the supporter. The email includes a link for the supporter to update their payment method in the Donor Portal.

By default, your Fundraise Up account uses machine learning to determine when to set a recurring plan’s status to Failed after unsuccessful charge attempts have been made. This default setting balances the opportunity to recover a recurring plan with avoiding potential fees for charge failures.

While the machine learning option is configured by default, you can also select from seven other options. You can wait for up to 6 unpaid installments before marking the recurring plan as failed, or never mark it as failed.

Fundraise Up supports all of the nine recurring giving frequencies which can be enabled for Checkout modals, Campaign Pages, the Donor Portal and the Virtual Terminal:

• daily
• weekly
• biweekly
• every 4 weeks
• monthly
• bimonthly
• quarterly
• semiannual
• annual

Recurring plans can be managed by supporters and your organization’s Fundraise Up users.

The Donor Portal is a self-service dashboard where your supporters can manage their fundraisers and recurring plans, view donation history, and update their profile information. Learn more →

Users with the Organization Administrator, Campaign Administrator, and Support Specialist user roles can manage recurring plans from the Dashboard.

Editing a recurring plan’s campaign and designation

By clicking Edit in the top-right corner of the Recurring plan block, these 3 types of users can change the campaign that each recurring plan is attached to, as well as the designation chosen by the supporter for their recurring plan.

By default, these changes will only apply to future installments within this recurring plan, meaning past installments will still be attached to the previous campaign and designation. If you wish to apply changes to all the previous installments too, check the Update previous installments checkbox.

Receipt email options

Clicking Edit in the top-right corner of the Recurring plan block also allows you to opt supporters out of receipt emails for their donation installments. Receipts will still always be generated as per your Receipt settings, but won’t be sent out to supporters if you uncheck the Opted in to email receipts checkbox.

Cancel a recurring plan

To cancel a recurring plan from the Dashboard, follow these steps:

1. Navigate to Recurring > [The recurring plan you want to cancel].
2. Click Cancel recurring.
3. Select a cancellation reason from the drop-down menu (mandatory).

When supporters cancel their recurring plans through the Donor Portal, they are presented with an optional text field to explain their reason for canceling. Our system categorizes this explanation and records both the reason and the details under the recurring plan.

You can view this information in the Dashboard or export it using the Export tool. In the exported file, the details will appear under the Cancellation reason and Cancellation details fields.

There are seven main statuses for recurring plans in Fundraise Up:

Sometimes, a supporter creates a recurring plan using one payment method, but later wishes to update the recurring plan to a different payment method. Supporters can make this change without needing to request it from your organization by accessing their Donor Portal. Learn more →

Saved payment method details can continue to work even if the physical card has been replaced by the issuing bank. Stripe works with card networks and automatically attempts to update saved card details whenever a supporter receives a new card (for example, replacing an expired card or one that was reported lost or stolen). This allows your supporters to continue their recurring giving without interruption and reduces the need for you to collect new card details whenever a card is replaced.

Because Stripe charges 0.25 USD for each card update, Fundraise Up applies these automatic card updates to recurring plans only. This means that recurring plans can remain unaffected by expired cards, but your organization won’t pay for unnecessary storage of card details in Stripe for one-time donations.

Choose at what point the system should mark a recurring plan as ‘failed’. You can choose by the amount of unsuccessful installments, let machine learning decide, or never mark them as failed. Machine learning is chosen by default, as it best balances the opportunity to recover a recurring plan with avoiding potential fees for charge failures. Learn more about recurring plans →

Choose which donation frequencies will be available as an option for your campaigns. If you disable any of these frequencies, existing recurring plans that use this frequency will not be affected. You cannot disable frequencies that are being actively used in a campaign.

Сreate individualized links for your recurring supporters that allow them to increase their regular donation easily, quickly and securely. Learn more about Upgrade Links and how to create them →