With JustGiving, organizations in the United States can decide to process donations through Blackbaud Merchant Services™ (BBMS) or through a third-party that disburses donations to your organization via a the Blackbaud Giving Fund, a public charity and donor advised fund (DAF) and a partner of Blackbaud. Each comes with various features and terms, designed specifically for donor satisfaction and transactional security. The processing option you choose at the time of account configuration applies to all donations processed on the platform. Administrators can work with Customer Support if you determine at some point you want to switch from one processing option to another.

Organizations processing in Canada are required to use BBMS to process donations.

First thing is first... What is a payment processor?

Simply put, a payment processor safely moves money from your donor’s bank account to you.

When selecting a payment processor, here are a few things to consider for priority:

• Safely transmitting a donor’s secure information
• Gift conversion rates
• Disbursement of funds to your organization
• Fee Models

In most cases, setting up the payment processor is a one-time thing, completed at the time of account set up so you can continue to receive and process the gifts submitted on your site.

How it works

We know it’s important for you to quickly and safely receive your funds so you can focus on your mission and help more good take over. With both payment processing options, you can report on gifts received from JustGiving as well as receive the net totals deposited in your bank account on a regular cadence.

When utilizing BBMS, your organization will receive donations according to the set schedule with BBMS, most likely daily. This is ideal if you are running large campaigns or events through JustGiving. Disbursement reporting is completed through the BBMS Web Portal (but donor and fundraisers reports are available in JustGiving too) and donors can cover the 5% platform fee.

Alternatively, the Blackbaud Giving Fund disburses donations weekly basis via ACH or monthly via check. There are reduced fees when using the Blackbaud Giving Fund and all reporting is conducted through JustGiving.

You can learn more here or by downloading our information sheet.

Did you know?

On average, a website’s main donation page conversion rate is 22% (2020 M+R Benchmarks Study); the overall conversion rate for JustGiving exceeds the industry average at 68%, with even higher conversions (72%) to individual fundraising pages.

Explore the Features

We recommend choosing the processing option that that best meets your needs. Read on to compare options and find the best match.  In addition to the standard JustGiving features, organizations processing donations on JustGiving and receiving disbursements through the Blackbaud Giving Fund also have access to the Giving Check Out Stand Alone Donation Button.

Processing Fees

JustGiving has no annual subscription fee.

We are committed to continuously innovating to provide you and your supporters with the best user experience. This includes considering platform fees that work better for you, so more money goes to your cause. Processing fees are outlined here.

If your organization uses BBMS to process your JustGiving donations, donors are presented with an option to cover the 5% platform fee. We find the majority of donors choose to offset the cost to the organization by covering the platform fee.

If your organization receives disbursements from Blackbaud Giving Fund, there is no JustGiving platform fee charged to the organization. Instead, donors are given the option to provide a voluntary contribution to help with the cost of maintaining our platform should they wish. Standard credit card fees apply.

In the US, you can set up your payment processing option by logging into JustGiving.com and visiting the “Settings” tab of your account. By default, in the US, if you take no action your donations will be disbursed via the DAF and paid to you via check on a regular basis to the address we have on file, once your organization has a minimum of $50 in donations ready to distribute.

If you are currently using BBMS for JustGiving and would prefer to have donations disbursed via the DAF, you can remove your existing BBMS configuration to default to the DAF. Please contact support for further help with changing your processing option.

Please note: The Donor Advised Fund is not available in Canada. Organizations fundraising in Canada are required to set up and configure BBMS during the initial account set up process.

Note: Any donations processed prior to setting up or connecting BBMS, will be processed and paid via the Blackbaud Giving Fund, see above.