Learn more about the differences between the two pricing options available through Givebacks (formerly MemberHub) Fundraisers.

To continue providing an exceptional fundraising platform, Givebacks is powered by fees collected through each experience. Every experience run on Givebacks fundraisers is subject to two types of fees:

1. The Givebacks fee (also known as the “platform fee”)

Your organization (or its donors) will only have to pay the Givebacks fees when you have an active experience.  There are no additional subscription fees for Givebacks fundraisers.

2. Credit card processing fee

Every type of experience can collect payments by credit card. All credit card processing is performed by Stripe, not Givebacks. Like every payment processor, they charge their own fee for processing payments. As of July 1st, 2023 the processing fee Is 2.9% +$0.30/transaction (3.5% +$0.50/transaction for American Express).

Options for covering fees

To accommodate the needs of all organizations, we offer two main options for covering fees: free pricing or percent pricing. Discover the main differences between these pricing models below. 

Free pricing

Free pricing allows organizations to keep nearly 100% of the funds raised. You won’t need to budget for the cost of using our platform, and there are no hidden costs or subscription fees. It allows donors to chip in and cover the cost of fundraising on your organization’s behalf, thereby maximizing donation amounts for your cause. 

1. Platform fee 

With the free pricing model, the platform fee is covered by providing donors the option to leave a tip in the checkout process. This tip is optional for donors; they can opt out of leaving a tip on their donation if they choose. The money from the tip goes to Givebacks and is therefore separate from the donation amount that the organization receives. If no donor leaves a tip, there are still no platform fees charged on the experience. 

Free pricing is an attractive choice for many experience organizers because it allows the nonprofit organization to keep more of the funds raised. 

The platform fee for the free pricing model works a bit differently for raffles and sweepstakes versus other experience styles: 

• • Raffles and Sweepstakes – If donors choose to leave a tip on the experience, they will receive a few bonus entries into the drawing for doing so. Your organization runs the entire experience for free. 
  • Non-drawing experiences – For a-thons, events, challenges, sales, and crowdfunding experiences, donors will still have the option to leave a tip to cover the platform cost. Again, the tip is optional and allows the organization to keep more of the funds raised. For non-drawing experience, donors do not receive anything extra for leaving a tip. There are still no subscriptions, contracts, or upfront costs for running a experience, and this pricing model allows you to keep nearly all of the funds raised. 

2. Credit card processing fee – With free pricing, the Credit Card Processing fee will automatically come out of the amount raised by the organization. In other words, the organization covers the Credit Card Processing fee on each donation by having it deducted from the donation funds. There is not an option to have the donor cover the Credit Card Processing fee with the free pricing model.

 

Take this example:

A donor makes a $10 donation and leaves a $2.50 tip. The total amount charged to the donor is $12.50. For this transaction, your Payout report will show the total amount charged to the donor, the fees deducted, and finally, the net amount your organization receives.

Here’s how this breaks down:

• Your organization receives: $9.48 ($10 donation minus the Credit Card processing fee of $0.52)
• Givebacks receives: $2.43 ($2.50 tip minus the Credit Card processing fee of $0.06)

Percent pricing

Percent pricing is an alternative to the free pricing model and is ideal for organizations with a set budget or corporate sponsor who prefer not to have their donors prompted for tips after checkout. 

With the percent pricing model, both the platform and credit card processing fees can be paid for by the organization running the experience, the donors, or both (by splitting the fees between each).

1. Platform fee - With the percent pricing model, the 7.5% platform fee will be applied to each transaction.

You can choose to cover this fee by: 

• Adding it onto the donor’s payment
• Having the organization pay it by deducting it from the amount raised through the experience
• Giving the donor the option to cover it in the checkout process

2. Credit card processing fee – As with the platform fee, the percent pricing model provides different options for covering the credit card processing fee. You can cover this fee by:

• Adding it onto the donor’s payment
• Having the organization pay it by deducting it from the amount raised through the experience

Have the donor pay both fees

During experience setup, you may therefore choose to have both the platform fee and credit card processing fee added to each donation to be paid by the donor. This would allow you to maximize the amount received for each donation.

 

Have the organization pay both fees

Or, you can choose to have your organization cover both fees. This option would not add on any fees to the donor; the donor would only be charged the amount of their donation, and the organization would pay the fees by having them automatically deducted from the total amount raised on their experience.

Split the fees

• • You may choose to have the donor pay the platform fee and not the credit card processing fee. Your organization would then become responsible for the credit card processing fee, and the amount would be deducted from funds raised.
  • You may choose to have the donor pay the credit card processing fee and not the platform fee. Your organization would then become responsible for the platform fee, and the amount would be deducted from funds raised.
  • You could also give the donor the option to pay the platform fee in the checkout process. If they choose to pay it, you will not be responsible for that donation’s platform fee; if they don’t, it will come out of their donation amount. 
    • Convenience fees –You may also choose to add a convenience fee to split the fees between the donor and the organization. A convenience fee is a one-time amount added to each donation. The amount of the convenience fee is determined by the experience organizer and entered into the setup for each experience. The convenience fee gets added to the donation and will be applied towards any fees that come out of the amount raised.

Take this Example:

You may choose to have the donor cover the credit card fees but decide to split the platform fee with the donor. Let’s say the average donation on the experience is $100. If the platform fee is 7.5%, the platform fee will be $7.50. The organization may consider adding a convenience fee of $5 to each donation to split the platform fee between the donor and the organization. This way, the donor pays $5 and the organization would only be responsible for $2.50.

Or as another example:

A donor makes a $10 donation. Your Stripe dashboard will show the $10 donation made, along with the Givebacks application fee and the Credit Card processing fees.

Here’s how this breaks down:

• Your organization receives a $10 donation minus Givebacks “platform fee” of 7.5% and the Credit Card Processing fee (unless you chose to pass any or all of these fees to the donor).
• Givebacks receives between 7.5% of the $10 donation.

All of these options are available to you during the experience setup process. While there are many pricing options to consider, our objective is to ensure all organizations have the freedom to set up fees in the way that best suits their budgetary requirements and fundraising goals.