On rare occasions, a pledge can fail when the donor’s credit card is unable to be processed, usually due to an expired or canceled credit card. There is an automated procedure in place to collect on failed pledges, which includes immediately notifying the donor about their failed pledge.
How It Works
If a pledge charge fails, the platform will retry the charge in a series of five attempts, each 24 hours apart. During this period, a pledge will be marked as “Failing” when viewed in your Dashboard and Donation report.
As part of this procedure, the donor is sent an email notifying them about their failed pledge and prompting them to update a new card. Uploading a new credit card will restart the series of five attempts, generally with the first attempt leading to a successful charge.
If the donor does not update a new card when prompted, the system continues with a total of five attempts to retry the card on file. They are notified by email of each failed attempt and if all five retry attempts fail without them updating a new card, the pledge is marked as “Failed” and no further attempts are made to charge the card.
Note: When a donor updates their credit card on file for their pledge, it does not immediately charge that card. The charges are initiated 24 hours apart, so it will charge overnight after they've uploaded it.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the best way to monitor failing pledges?
We recommend downloading your Donation report in the day or two after your pledges are charged. If pledges were processed successfully, they will be marked as "Charged" in the Status column. Filtering your Donation report for "Failing" pledges can help you see which donors will be getting a reminder about updating their card on file.
You will also see in your Stripe account if their charge continues is continuing to fail each day or if it processes successfully. Looking in Stripe can help you see how far along in the failed pledge procedure they are.
What should communicate to the donor about their failing pledge?
The donor will receive an email that their pledge charge has failed, providing the option to upload a new card. They receive this email daily if their charge continues to fail. If you notice that their pledge is continuing to fail in Stripe (i.e. you're seeing three or four days of failed charges for a donor to the same card number) it's likely they haven't taken steps to update their card yet and you may want to call them and instruct them to follow the link in the email they received.
A donor who received the failed pledge notification is asking to send a check instead. How can I cancel their pledge?
Once the automated procedure begins to collect on their pledge, the pledge cannot be canceled. It is best to let the retry sequence run out before they send in their check.