Donors sometimes ask you to update a monthly gift by pausing it, moving it to another fund, or correcting the campaign. This article explains how to make those updates from the recurring gift’s Edit page, including how to suspend or cancel the gift and how each change affects billing.
Prerequisites
- You need access to the recurring gift’s record page in the Fundraising Console.
- To remove the recurring gift and everything it produced, see Delete a Recurring Gift instead.
Open the Edit Page
- Open the recurring gift’s record.
- Select Edit Recurring Gift.
Result
The Edit form opens with three sections: Donor, Recurring Gift Information, and Notes.
Change the Amount, Fund, Frequency, or Dates
- In the Recurring Gift Information section, update Date:, Amount:, Fund:, Campaign:, Appeal:, Giving Frequency:, or Next Gift Date: as needed. Fund: and Giving Frequency: are required; Campaign: and Appeal: are optional.
- Select Save Changes.
Warning
Changing the amount, fund, frequency, or next gift date updates the recurring gift record, but it does not change what the donor is charged. The donor continues to be billed under the terms already set up with your payment processor until you change the status to stop or pause billing. If the donor needs a different charge going forward, plan to cancel this recurring gift and start a new one, or contact Support if you are unsure how to proceed.
You cannot create a new recurring gift that starts on a future date. An initial donation is required to begin the recurring commitment, so the first charge happens when you process the recurring gift, not on a date you schedule ahead of time.
Warning
In some cases, an older recurring gift stops appearing in scheduled billing runs after its schedule dates are edited, even though the record itself looks unchanged. If a recurring gift seems to have stopped billing after you changed its dates, create a new recurring gift, process its first payment, and confirm the new one appears in the next billing run. Do not continue to rely on the edited recurring gift.
Suspend, Reactivate, or Cancel a Recurring Gift
Status is the only field on this page that updates billing.
- On the Edit page, open Status: and choose the status you want.
- If you choose Suspended, a Suspended Until: date field appears below Giving Frequency:. Enter the date the pause should end.
- Select Save Changes.
Result
The change is saved, and a background process updates the donor’s billing schedule to match the new status. Choosing Suspended pauses charges, choosing Active resumes them, and choosing Cancelled, or clearing the status entirely, stops them.
Warning
Suspended Until: looks required, but the Console does not enforce it. You can save a suspended recurring gift without an end date. Enter one anyway so you and the donor know when giving should resume; a recurring gift suspended with no end date stays suspended until someone changes it.
Tip
You can change from any status to any other status, and the Console does not check whether the change makes sense for the recurring gift’s current state. Double-check the current status before saving, especially before choosing Cancelled, since that stops billing.
If Your Change Is Refused
Warning
If Save Changes is refused with a message about the donor, you cannot change the donor on the record from this page. The donor selector lets you choose a different contact or organization, but the save is rejected because the recurring gift’s donor reference does not update to match. If a recurring gift is attributed to the wrong donor, contact Support instead of trying to fix it by choosing a different donor here.
The Form Errors panel can also block the save when a required field is missing a value. This can include fields not shown on this page, such as the recurring gift’s order. If the panel names a field you cannot see or fix here, contact Support.
Cancel Without Saving
Select Cancel to leave without saving. If you changed anything, you are asked to confirm before your changes are discarded.