A donor gives $100 through your website and checks the box for the education fund, but meant the general fund. Another donor’s gift lands on a brand-new constituent record because they typed a work email. A third calls to say they fat-fingered $1,000 instead of $100. All three are “adjust the online gift” problems in Altru, but they are not the same fix, and treating them the same way is how revenue reports and the bank deposit stop agreeing.
The useful first question is not “how do I edit this gift?” It’s “am I changing information about the gift, or am I changing the money?”
Information changes vs. money changes
Information changes leave the amount the donor paid alone: designation, constituent, tribute or memorial details, recognition credit, appeal, notes. These are handled on the revenue record in Altru.
Money changes are refunds, partial refunds, or a corrected amount. These involve the card processor as well as Altru. Editing an amount on a revenue record does not put money back on anyone’s card, and refunding a card in your payment gateway does not by itself fix the revenue record. You need both sides to match.
Keep that split in mind and most of the confusion goes away.
Before you touch anything: check posting status
If your organization posts revenue to the general ledger from Altru, find out whether this gift has already been posted. This matters more than anything else on this page.
- Not yet posted: you generally have room to correct the revenue record directly, and the change flows into the next posting.
- Already posted: changes to amount, designation, or date typically create adjustment entries rather than quietly rewriting history, and finance will see them in the next export. That’s correct behavior, but finance should hear about it from you first.
Exactly which fields are locked or generate adjustments after posting depends on your Altru setup and permissions. If you’re not sure, test the same edit on a test gift in a sandbox or ask Blackbaud support before doing it on a live record. Also agree with finance on a cutoff: many teams avoid editing gifts in a closed month at all and make the correction in the current period instead.
Common fixes, one at a time
Wrong designation or fund
Open the revenue record, edit the designation, and add a note with the reason and who asked for it (“Donor emailed 4/12, intended general operating”). If the gift should be split across two designations, split it on the record rather than creating a second gift. If the gift was posted, expect an adjustment.
Gift landed on the wrong constituent
Online forms are a common source of duplicate constituents: a different email, a nickname, a new address. If the gift sits on a duplicate of an existing donor, the cleaner fix is usually to merge the duplicate into the real record, which brings the revenue along with it, instead of moving the single gift and leaving an orphan constituent behind. If the gift is genuinely on the wrong person (a spouse, say), change the constituent on the revenue record, or use household or recognition credit if both people should be credited.
Tribute, memorial, or acknowledgment details
Donors misspell honoree names all the time. Fix the tribute information on the gift, then check whether an acknowledgment or tribute notification already went out with the wrong name. If it did, the record fix doesn’t correct the letter; someone needs to send a corrected one.
Wrong amount or a full refund
Start with the processor. Issue the refund or partial refund through your payment gateway, then record the matching change in Altru so revenue reflects what you actually kept. How your organization records a donation refund in Altru (an adjustment to the original gift, a write-off, or reversing and re-entering) is partly a finance policy question; pick one method and use it every time. If the donor wanted $100 instead of $1,000, the cleanest approach is often a full refund and a new $100 gift, so the receipt the donor gets is accurate.
Wrong date
Be cautious here. The gift date drives fiscal-year reporting and tax receipts. Change it only to fix a real error, never to move revenue into a better-looking month.
After the fix
- Re-check the receipt. If the donor’s tax receipt now shows the wrong amount or designation, send a corrected one and keep a copy.
- Note it on the record. Date, reason, who requested it, who made it. Six months from now nobody will remember.
- Tell finance about anything that touches amount, designation, or a posted gift.
- Reconcile the deposit. Online gifts settle through the processor in batches. Make sure refunded or adjusted gifts still tie out to the deposit report for that day.
Prevent the next one
Many adjustments start on the form itself. A few things worth reviewing on your online donation form:
- Fewer, clearer designation choices. A donor picking from three options makes fewer mistakes than one picking from twelve.
- Suggested amounts as buttons, so fewer people type amounts by hand.
- Clear tribute fields with a label that says exactly what will be printed.
- A regular duplicate-constituent review for records created by web gifts, so merges happen before the gift needs fixing.
Then run a simple revenue query each month for web-sourced gifts that were edited or refunded. If one form or one designation keeps showing up, that’s where to make changes.
Quick answers
Does editing the amount in Altru refund the donor?
No. Refunds happen through your payment processor. Altru needs to be updated to match, but it won’t move money on its own.
Can I just delete the online gift and re-enter it?
Sometimes, if it hasn’t been posted and your permissions allow it, but deleting a processed online payment can break the link to the card transaction and make reconciliation harder. Correcting or adjusting the existing record is usually safer. Confirm your approach with finance first.
