Online Membership Mistake

Chelsey Aki

Hi,


In the last week, we had to make at least 5 refunds to donors who signed up as a membership for our garden but their membership was not intended for our organization. Their comments are very similar which states that they were on another organizations website trying to purchase a membership or do online shopping and after submitted their payment they receive an email confirmation from us. Also we get notification of their purchase as well plus their deposit into our bank account. Has any other organization experience something like this?

Heather Pauli

I believe we had something similar happen late last year; the donor stated they were online looking up another animal welfare organization and somehow made a donation to our organization. My best guess is our organization had a solicitation pop up on the webpage they were perusing, as we run online advertisements like this more frequently to appeal for year-end giving, and the donor might have clicked on it without reading it, thinking that the donation was going to the other group. It was a simple refund process, and only happened one time that I am aware of. Your marketing department might want to review the appeals that are online if they read like a general call to action instead of a solicitation specific to your group.