Every gala invitation list has a group of people who love the cause and still can’t come. They’re out of town, they don’t do black-tie, or $250 a plate isn’t in the budget. Many of them would gladly give something. The question is whether your event setup in Altru gives them a clear way to do it, and whether that money lands somewhere you can find it after the event.
This guide covers how to offer a “can’t attend, want to give” option, how to code those gifts so they count toward the event, and where Altru’s native tools may or may not stretch.
Decide what a non-attendee gift actually is
Before you build anything, settle one thing with your development and finance staff: is a non-attendee gift event revenue or a donation that happens to be related to the event? The answer drives everything else.
- Registrations and tickets usually include a benefit (dinner, entertainment), so only the part above fair market value is tax-deductible.
- A gift from someone who isn’t attending has no benefit attached, so it’s generally fully deductible. That’s a different acknowledgment letter and a different receipt amount.
Mixing the two on one transaction makes acknowledgments harder to get right. Keeping them as separate revenue, tied together by coding, is cleaner. Your auditor or finance lead should have the final word on how your organization treats it.
The simplest setup: a dedicated donation form for the event
Altru’s event registration is built around people who are registering. Whether your version lets someone add a standalone donation on an event registration form without registering is something to test in your sandbox or confirm with Blackbaud support rather than assume. The reliable approach doesn’t depend on that answer:
- Create (or reuse) a donation web form just for this event. Title it plainly: “Can’t make it to the Spring Gala? Support it anyway.”
- Point the gift at the right designation. Use the same designation your event proceeds support, so the money goes to the right fund in your GL.
- Attach an appeal or source code specific to the event (for example, “2027 Gala – Non-attendee”). This is the piece that lets you report on these gifts later and add them to event totals.
- Set suggested amounts that make sense next to your ticket price. If tickets are $250, offering $50, $100, $250 and “other” gives people a way to match a ticket without attending, or give at a level that fits.
- Link to it everywhere the event appears: the registration page, the invitation email, the event landing page, and the reply card in printed invitations.
The second link on the registration page matters most. People who’ve already decided they can’t come often land there first. A short line under the “Register” button, such as “Can’t attend? Give in support of the evening,” catches them at the right moment.
Handling sponsorships from people who won’t attend
Some donors want to sponsor at a named level but skip the event itself. Two common ways to handle it:
- Treat it as a sponsorship with declined benefits. Record it the same way as other sponsorships and note on the record that the donor declined the seats, so the acknowledgment reflects the full deductible amount. Make sure your staff know how to mark that consistently.
- Offer “underwrite a seat” giving. Some organizations let non-attendees fund a seat for a teacher, volunteer or community guest. This is a donation, coded to the event’s appeal, and it gives the donor something concrete to picture.
Reporting: getting a full event total
Once registrations and non-attendee gifts live in different places, someone will ask, “What did the gala raise?” Plan the answer before the event, not after.
- Build a revenue query that pulls everything carrying the event’s appeal or source code, plus event registration revenue for that event. Save it, and check it during the campaign so you notice coding mistakes while you can still fix them.
- Test it with a few dummy transactions in your sandbox before the invitation goes out.
- If staff enter mailed checks from non-attendees, give them the exact appeal and designation to use. Gifts entered without the code are the usual reason event totals come up short.
Acknowledge them differently
A non-attendee thank-you shouldn’t read like a ticket confirmation. Skip the parking directions and dress code. Thank them for supporting the evening from afar, state the deductible amount, and, if you can, send a short recap after the event so they feel included. That follow-up is often what turns a one-time “sorry I can’t make it” gift into an attendee next year.
Making the giving page match the event
The weak spot in this setup is usually the donation form itself: a generic page that doesn’t look like the event invitation and is awkward on a phone, which is where most people open those emails. Social Good’s Checkouts replaces Altru web forms for donations with a branded, mobile-friendly checkout that supports Apple Pay and Google Pay, and the gift writes back to Altru, so your designation and coding approach above still applies.
Quick answers
Can I just add a donation line to the event registration form?
Possibly, depending on your Altru setup, but test whether a visitor can complete it without registering. A separate donation form is the safer option for people who won’t attend.
Should non-attendee gifts count toward the event goal?
Most organizations count them, as long as they carry the event’s appeal code. Agree on that with finance before you announce totals.
