All Leaders

  • 1.  Which Opportunities Do You Use to Gather Donations Electronically?

    Posted 01-08-2026 01:21 PM

    I am curious about which electronic services your congregation uses to accept donations electronically. Our congregation participates in the LCEF-sponsored "Joyful Response" program. I think it is great. I receive weekly and monthly reports about who has donated and how much. LCEF has paid any transaction fees.

    We also accept electronic donations through Breeze Church Management Systems, which we use for our church database. Breeze charges a transaction fee for each donation. They also inform the donor of the amount of the fee and give the donor the opportunity to cover the cost. Some donors do, many don't.

    Occasionally, I am asked if the church accepts Venmo. This is usually when a school parent wants to purchase a used uniform or someone wants to pay some other special fee.

    Doing some research, I stumbled across a service created for non-profits. The service is called "Zeffy." Zeffy's website says they pass 100% of any donation on to the church or non-profit. Has anyone used them? If so, what are the pros & cons?

    Let's go ahead and broaden the discussion to include any electronic service you may be using. What is it? What do you like about it? What challenges are produced by using it?

    I am looking forward to your responses.

    Blessings,

    Steve



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    Steve Haar
    St. Paul Lutheran Church and School
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  • 2.  RE: Which Opportunities Do You Use to Gather Donations Electronically?

    Posted 01-09-2026 10:54 AM

    Looking forward to hearing responses that are alternatives to Venmo



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    Jill George
    Jill George
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  • 3.  RE: Which Opportunities Do You Use to Gather Donations Electronically?

    Posted 01-10-2026 09:35 AM
    We use Vanco.  It was recommended to us, but I don't remember who maybe CEF.  We originally didn't have to pay fees but now we do.  fees are based on how much we receive in a month.  But I don't know how they calculate it.

    Richard T
    St Trinity Clarkston, MI





  • 4.  RE: Which Opportunities Do You Use to Gather Donations Electronically?

    Posted 01-12-2026 12:02 PM
    Hi.
    This option is not administered by the congregation, but I have found the Donor Advised Fund (DAF) route to be an easy option for online giving. If you're not familiar, an individual makes a contribution to a DAF of, for example, appreciated stock. Instead of paying tax on gains on the stock's growth, the contribution counts as a charitable donation for the individual up front. Afterward, the account owner doesn't own the assets per se, but can invest it and distribute it to charities little by little with a few mouse clicks. I have mine set up to automatically direct deposit my offering monthly to my church's bank account. The individual pays annual admin fees plus the expense ratios of the DAF investments selected by the account owner. There is no charge to the recipient charity.
    B





  • 5.  RE: Which Opportunities Do You Use to Gather Donations Electronically?

    Posted 01-13-2026 09:16 AM
    We also use Vanco. Thrivent offered the option at first called "Simply Giving" and paid the fees but discontinued that later. It works pretty well overall. You can embed a button into your website and customize funds for donations. You can generate QR codes. There's also a text giving option but I haven't looked into more. Members can set up recurrent offerings or do a one time gift. There's an option to help offset fees. ACH transfers only have a transaction fee. Credit card transactions have a fee and deduct a percentage from the total offering also. Shepherd Staff has the ability to import the Vanco offerings which is helpful. I also have deposit/fund reports emailed to me for each transaction to double check that we are recording them all correctly. 

    Ginny Ranisate, Office Manager
    St. Johns Lutheran Church
    803 W First St
    Park Rapids, MN 56470
    218-732-9783





  • 6.  RE: Which Opportunities Do You Use to Gather Donations Electronically?

    Posted 01-21-2026 03:45 PM

    We use Tithely.  They also require a fee and give the donor an option to cover the fee.  They allow multiple giving fund options for special giving, etc, that you can set up.  A few years ago I would have said I love it, but now it has been "updated" so many times that they have removed some features that made it more compatible for me to upload into Shepherds Staff.  They offer a wide range of modules that we don't use because we are a smaller church and don't need them. 



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    Cheryl Schnicker
    St. James Lutheran Church
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