When a donor calls with a check number or reads a card over the phone, you can process the gift or pledge for them. Choose the donor and giving process, enter the gift or pledge details, then complete the same checkout flow used by Portal donation forms. Rhythm creates a real order for the gift or pledge, so the payment and record match a donation the donor would make on the Portal.
Before You Begin
Prerequisites
- You need access to process gifts for a gift, or pledges for a pledge, in the Fundraising Console.
- Your account needs Fundraising settings with a default giving process, unless you choose a giving process when you start.
- Know which donor you’re processing for. If the donor is new, you can search for them and quick-add their contact record when you start.
Start Processing
- For a gift, go to Fundraising & Gifts › Gifts and select Process Gift. For a pledge, go to Fundraising & Gifts › Pledges and select Process Pledge.
- In Select the Donor:, choose whether the giver is a person or an organization, then search for and select them.
- In Giving Process:, choose the giving process whose rules should apply, including its suggested amounts, gift types, and receipt. Leave it blank to use your account’s default giving process.
- Select Continue.
Result
Rhythm opens the gift or pledge details form for the donor and giving process you selected.
Tip
Your browser remembers the last giving process you selected here, so you do not need to choose it again if you usually process the same kind of gift. This memory is shared between gift and pledge processing.
Tip
If you want most donors to give or pledge on the Portal, but you only want staff to take pledges by phone, you do not need a dedicated staff-only pledge setting. Keep your default, Portal-facing giving process limited to one-time and recurring donations, then set up a second giving process that allows pledges for staff to choose here. Because the Portal never links to that second process, staff can select it in Giving Process: to take pledges in the Console without showing those pledges to Portal donors.
Enter Gift Details
- Enter the Amount: and choose the Fund:. The Console lets you choose any active fund, so the giving process’s Portal fund restrictions do not apply here.
- Optionally choose a Campaign: and Appeal:.
- Check This is an anonymous gift if the donor asked not to be named.
- Check This gift amount is allocated/split to additional funds if you need to divide the gift across more than one fund.
- If the giving process allows tributes, enter the tribute details when the gift is in someone’s honor or memory.
- If the giving process enables thank-you gifts, choose a premium that applies to the amount, or select No thank you gift.
- If the giving process allows recurring gifts, check Make this a recurring gift and choose a Frequency: — Monthly, Quarterly, or Annually, depending on what the process allows.
- Select Next.
Tip
You can set up and process quarterly giving schedules entirely in the Console this way. This helps when a donor has trouble completing a quarterly pledge or gift on the Portal.
Enter Pledge Details
Pledge processing follows the same pattern, with one difference: instead of choosing a recurring-gift frequency, you choose a Pledge Timing: from the payment schedules, or installment plans, offered by the giving process. Pledge processing is available only when the giving process allows pledges and has at least one payment schedule configured. The plans you see here, and the friendly name shown for each one, come from the installment plans an administrator set up on the giving process itself. See Giving Form Options to change which plans are offered or how they are worded for donors.
- Enter the Amount:, choose the Fund:, and optionally the Campaign: and Appeal:.
- Choose a Pledge Timing: option.
- Complete anonymity, splits, tribute, and thank-you gift choices as they apply.
- Select Next.
Complete Checkout
- On Order Details, enter the payment method and any other order information Rhythm asks for.
- Select Next, then review the summary on Review Order.
- Select Process Order.
Result
Rhythm processes the payment and, once it succeeds, opens the new gift’s or pledge’s page — its Gift 360 or Pledge 360 — so you can confirm the details right away.
This is the same order flow donors complete on the Portal, with one difference: the Portal always collects payment before it processes a one-time gift, recurring gift, or pledge, so a Portal donor cannot be invoiced or asked to pay later. Processing a gift in the Console gives you more flexibility. On Order Details, you can choose an invoice or another pay-later option the same way you would for any other unpaid order in Rhythm. This lets you take a gift over the phone even when the donor plans to pay later, such as by mailing a check.
Tip
If the gift or pledge does not open immediately after checkout, Rhythm shows "We're still writing the gift information to the database... try again in a few seconds." Rhythm does not retry automatically, so select the button again after a moment. This can happen after any payment method, including an invoice or pay-later option instead of a card. A pay-later gift or pledge is created as soon as Process Order finishes, so it will still be there once Rhythm catches up. If this message keeps reappearing instead of opening the gift or pledge, check whether the record was already created, such as by searching for it, before you select the button again or restart the submission. The order may have already gone through even though the page has not caught up, and resubmitting could create a duplicate.
Recording an Offline Payment on a Pledge
A pledge you already processed is billed in installments on its own schedule. If a donor pays one of those installments by check or another method you record by hand, do not enter that payment through pledge processing again. Instead, bill the installment onto an invoice first, then receive the payment the same way you would for any other invoice:
- Open the pledge and use Process Now on its installment schedule to bill the next installment onto an invoice right away, instead of waiting for it to bill on its own schedule.
- Open that invoice and receive the offline payment on it, the same way you receive a payment on any other open invoice in Finance & Billing.
Result
The invoice's balance drops to zero, and the payment appears on the pledge's Financials tab alongside its other invoices and payments.
If It Fails
- "You have not configured fundraising settings. Please configure Fundraising settings before continuing." Your account needs a default giving process in Fundraising settings before you can process a gift or pledge without choosing a process.
- A gift over a fund's yearly limit is refused. Some funds have an annual contribution limit. If a gift would push a donor’s yearly total past that limit, Rhythm refuses it when you select Next.
- Pledges aren't available for the giving process you chose. The process must allow pledges and have at least one payment schedule configured. Choose a different process, or ask your administrator to add a payment schedule to this one.
- Recurring gifts aren't offered for the process you chose. The giving process must allow recurring gifts and enable the frequency you want before the recurring option appears.
- Pledge submissions are failing broadly on the Portal. If you suspect a widespread issue rather than a problem with one donor's card, an administrator can turn off Pledges on the affected giving process to remove the pledge option from the donation form while the issue is investigated. This will not fix an underlying problem, but it can reduce how many donors run into it while you or Support look into it, and you can turn pledges back on once it is resolved.