Although it's not common, it's possible for donors to file disputes about the charges they see on their bank statements. The dispute process is initiated at the donor's bank and moderated by the payment processor, Stripe. While this is fairly commonplace in the retail environment, it's rare that donors file this type of dispute without first contacting their church.
How rare is it? In Planning Center Giving, only one in every 65,466 donations is disputed.
Even though disputes are uncommon, we know you want to track each and every donation accurately and responsibly in your books.
In the event of a dispute, Giving will now spring into action:
- You'll get an email alert letting you know there's a new dispute that needs attention.
- Using the new "disputed" stamp, you can filter the donations to list all donations in dispute.
- At the top of the donation details page, you'll see a big red message letting you know the donation is in dispute and what the current status is at Stripe. There will also be a link to the transaction in Stripe.
- Giving will keep a record of the disputed status changes in the "Activity Log" on the donation itself.
- In the event that a dispute is "lost" or receives a "charge_refunded" status at Stripe, Giving will exclude that donation from any statements issued by the church (since the church never received that money).
Here's what a disputed donation looks like in Giving:
In the event a donor disputes a charge, here is the email you'll get as an administrator:
We hope this helps you track disputed donations effectively, if it ever happens!
~ Team Giving
(Mo, Josh, Wassim, Dma, Jeremy)
