For a nonprofit, processing fees are a direct subtraction from the mission. A flat 2.9% + 30¢ on every gift is simple to advertise and expensive to hold, because it ignores two facts: card networks offer reduced interchange for many 501(c)(3) transactions, and ACH costs a fraction of cards for recurring gifts. A processor’s pricing model decides whether the organization ever sees either benefit.
QorPay prices interchange-plus. The organization pays what the network charges, plus a stated margin. When a donation qualifies for the nonprofit interchange category, the savings land in the nonprofit’s settlement, not in the processor’s spread.
How should recurring giving be set up?
Recurring donors are the most valuable donors, and the biggest threat to them is a silent payment failure. On QorCommerce, the donor’s credential is tokenized into the vault at the first gift. Monthly charges run against the token, and declines return documented response codes. A reissued card becomes a follow-up task, not a lapsed donor discovered at year-end. For donors willing to give by bank debit, ACH tokens cut the cost of a $50 monthly gift to almost nothing.
What does the giving mix look like in practice?
Card-not-present dominates: the website donation form, the emailed appeal, the peer-to-peer campaign. Hosted checkout and secure embedded forms handle those without pulling the nonprofit’s website into PCI scope. Card-present still matters at events: QorConnect terminals cover the gala and the giving kiosk.
Do faith-based and advocacy organizations get declined elsewhere?
Sometimes. Certain categories get flagged by generic risk models. Automated Underwriting reviews the actual organization (registration, history, funding pattern), and because QorPay is the processor, the decision is made here, not forwarded upstream.