My ChurchSuite - My Giving
In this article
In this article, we talk about the My Giving section of My ChurchSuite. This is where you can view and make donations plus add and manage your pledges and Gift Aid declarations (UK only). Note that the areas you can see and actions that you can perform are subject to your church's settings.
Donations
Selecting My Giving from the Menu opens the Donations tab:
This section shows a summary of your recent personal donation and, for UK churches only, the Gift Aid that is claimable on each donation (or the Tax Deductible status, for North America and Singapore). You can further filter the list to see a particular tax year or filing year:
If enabled by your church, you can also use the Donate option which will open the Donate page, allowing you to make one-off and recurring online donations to one of your church's funds or causes:
Making a donation
From the Donate page, you can enter the Amount you wish to give and choose a Fund to give towards. Choose the donation Frequency, selecting between a One-off or a Recurring donation and the payment Method.
For UK users, you can optionally Gift Aid your donation by checking the box. You also may be given the option to increase your donation to cover the transaction fees incurred by your church. Next, enter your Email address and, after accepting the data protection statement, you can Proceed to the next step.
If you have used Donate on your device before, you'll be taken to the payment details stage; otherwise, a security code will be sent to your email address, which you can enter into the form to confirm your identity. You can optionally select Remember me on this device, which will mean that you won't be prompted for a security code for that email address on that device in the future. Click Proceed.
Card donations
Your donation details are summarised, showing the amount, frequency and fund. Enter your Card details or, depending on the device, you may be able to select ApplePay or Google Pay.
Once the donation has been made, a success message will be displayed, confirming the donation has been immediately processed. You'll also receive a confirmation email when the payment request has been approved and completed. If you chose to make a recurring donation, this will be recorded as a pledge on your profile (see below). You'll receive a confirmation email each time the pledge is processed on the appropriate 'due date'. Pledge confirmation emails contain a Manage Giving link through which the you can manage your recurring donation.
Direct Debit donations (Bank)
Your donation details are summarised, showing the amount, frequency and fund. Click Proceed to GoCardless to complete the transaction, which requires entry of your bank sort code and account number.
Once the donation has been made, a success message will displayed. For direct debit payments, a success message will be displayed, confirming that the transaction is being processed by your bank. The success page can be closed, even if the transaction is still processing. You'll also receive a confirmation email when the payment request has been approved and completed. If you chose to make a recurring donation, this will be recorded as a pledge on your profile (see below). You'll receive a confirmation email each time the pledge is processed on the appropriate 'due date'. Pledge confirmation emails contain a Manage Giving link through which the you can manage your recurring donation.
Pledges
If enabled by your church, the Pledges tab enables you to view and manage your existing giving pledges. A pledge is automatically added for recurring online donations made through ChurchSuite Donate (as discussed above) but you can also add a pledge for the regular donations you make by other donation methods. Pledges are non-binding but they help your church to create budgets based on future pledged income. Your church finance team will link the pledged donations you make (by any method) to your pledge, enabling you to visualise pledge progress here in My Giving.
To add a pledge, click Add pledge:
Select the fund that your pledge is for, the start date of your pledge, an optional end date, the pledge frequency and amount. You can also optionally add a one-off amount, if you plan to make a single donation for your pledge that's different to the recurring amount. Click Save:
You can easily make changes to your recurring online giving using the Manage option:
For recurring bank/direct debit donations, the Manage option enables you to make changes to a pledge amount or cancel a pledge - perhaps to set up a new pledge for a different date or frequency or give from a different bank account. For recurring card donations, the Manage option enables you to change the donation amount, add a pledge end date, change your payment card or cancel your pledge altogether. You'll be required to enter an access code when self-managing an online donation pledge - either from My ChurchSuite or the Manage Giving link in your pledge confirmation emails. The access code will be sent to your registered My ChurchSuite email address and is valid for two hours or the duration of the active browsing session, after which time the code expires.
Declarations
Finally, for UK churches and charities, the Declarations tab enables you to manage the active Gift Aid declarations you've provided so your church can reclaim Gift Aid.
If you're a UK taxpayer, then you can add or end an active declaration at any time.
To add a declaration, click Add declaration. You can then select which fund/s the declaration relates to and enter the declaration start date and optional) end date. You are permitted to optionally backdate the declaration start date to up to four years from today's date, enabling your church to reclaim Gift Aid on your historic donations to the selected fund/s. The declaration will remain active until the end date is reached or, if you leave the end date empty, the declaration will run until further notice. Click Save:
Ending a declaration will end the declaration today and will prevent your church from reclaiming Gift Aid on future donations to the declaration's fund/s made after today - unless there's another active declaration covering the date and fund/s of those donations:
