A supporter gives through JustGiving. A few days later the payout lands in your bank account, and the amount is smaller than what the donor actually gave, because the platform’s fees came out first. So what goes into Altru: the amount the donor gave, or the amount you received?
The answer affects donor giving history, acknowledgment letters, and whether development and finance agree at month end. Below is how we’d set it up, where Altru helps, and where you’ll need a workaround.
Record the gross gift on the donor’s record
For most organizations the right default is to enter the full amount the donor gave as the revenue amount on their constituent record, and handle the fee as an expense outside the gift.
There are three reasons:
- Donor history stays accurate. The donor gave the full amount. If you record the net figure, their lifetime giving, giving levels, and any recognition based on cumulative totals come out low.
- Acknowledgments match what the donor remembers. A thank-you letter that names a smaller amount than the donor typed in prompts calls and doubts.
- Fees belong to finance. Processing and platform fees are a cost of fundraising. Your accounting system is built to track them, and your CRM is not.
Recording net amounts is easier the day you do it and causes trouble every time someone runs a giving report after that. If your organization already records JustGiving gifts net, decide on a cutover date and stick to it, so reports aren’t a mix of both methods with no way to tell them apart.
Where the fee goes
We’re not aware of a dedicated per-gift fee field on Altru revenue that flows to your general ledger the way a payment does. Your configuration may differ, so before you commit to a process, test it in a sandbox or ask Blackbaud support how they’d recommend recording third-party platform fees in your setup.
Practical options, from simplest to most detailed:
- Book fees in accounting only. Enter gross gifts in Altru. When the JustGiving payout arrives, finance records the deposit as gross revenue minus a fee expense line. Altru doesn’t hold the fee at all. This works well for most small and mid-sized shops.
- Track the fee as a note or attribute. If development wants to see cost per gift, add a revenue attribute or note with the fee amount. It’s informational only and won’t affect totals, but you can pull it into a query.
- Reconcile per payout. Keep the JustGiving payout report with each batch so anyone can trace the difference between the batch total and the bank deposit.
Setting up gift entry
A little configuration up front makes these gifts easy to find and report on later:
- A clear payment method or reference. Use a consistent payment method (or a reference field convention) so JustGiving gifts don’t blend in with checks or desk payments.
- A source or appeal code for JustGiving. If you run several JustGiving pages or peer-to-peer campaigns, give each its own appeal or source so you can see which ones performed.
- One batch per payout. Entering each JustGiving payout as its own batch, with the payout date and reference noted, makes bank reconciliation far easier. The batch total will be the gross figure, so finance should expect it to differ from the deposit by the fees.
- A standard designation. Make sure the designation matches the campaign the donor chose, not a catch-all general fund.
Donors you can’t identify
JustGiving shares donor contact details only when the donor agrees to it, so some gifts arrive with a name and amount but no address or email, or no name at all. Don’t create a new constituent for every partial record. Many organizations keep a single “JustGiving anonymous donors” constituent for gifts they can’t attribute, and search for an existing constituent before creating a new one for everyone else. Platform donors who also visit or hold a membership are a common source of duplicate records.
Tips and donor-covered costs
Depending on how your page is configured, donors may be asked to add a contribution to the platform itself. That money goes to JustGiving, not to you, so it shouldn’t appear in Altru. Check the payout report to see which columns are your donation and which aren’t. JustGiving’s fee structure has changed over the years, so read your current agreement rather than relying on what you set up previously.
Acknowledgments
JustGiving sends the donor its own confirmation, but that isn’t the same as a thank-you from you. If you send your own acknowledgment:
- Thank them for the full amount they gave, which matches the gross figure in Altru.
- Don’t mention fees unless you have a reason to. Donors rarely want an explanation of payment processing in a thank-you letter.
- Only acknowledge donors who shared contact details and agreed to hear from you. Respect the consent choices recorded with the gift.
- If you send formal tax receipts, confirm with your finance team or advisor whether the platform has already issued one. Sending two receipts for the same gift causes confusion.
If you’re a UK charity, Gift Aid may be claimed through the platform and paid to you separately. How you record that in Altru depends on your setup, so confirm the approach with Blackbaud support and your finance team before entering it as revenue.
Reporting that holds up
Once gifts are entered gross with a consistent source, a simple revenue query filtered to JustGiving gives development the fundraising total. Finance’s view, gross less fees, lives in the general ledger. Write down that the two numbers are expected to differ and why, so nobody spends an afternoon hunting for a “missing” amount that is really platform fees.
Quick answers
Should the donor’s giving total include the fee?
Yes. The donor gave the full amount; the fee is your cost of receiving it.
Can I just enter the payout as one gift?
Only if you have no donor details at all. Otherwise you lose the donor history that makes the gift useful for stewardship.
