Recurring Donations lets your customers give a set amount on a regular basis, monthly or yearly, without making a fresh donation each time. Once a customer signs up, their chosen amount is taken automatically on every renewal, so your venue builds a steady stream of support with no extra work at the box office.
Important
Recurring Donations is in alpha testing and only available on accounts using Ticketsolve Pay. If your account isn't set up for this, donation products work exactly as they always have, with one-off giving only. If you'd like recurring donations switched on, get in touch.
How recurring donations work
Recurring donations are built on your existing donation products. Each donation product can offer One-off, Monthly and Yearly purchase options in any combination, so you can run a donation as one-off only, recurring only, or both. The amount and the frequency are independent: customers choose how much to give and how often, from the options you've configured.
Some important features to know about:
- To purchase a recurring donation, customers must have an online account activated (as this is how they can manage their recurring donation, like cancelling it).
- A recurring donation is always taken separately from tickets and other products. It can't sit in a cart alongside a ticket order.
- The customer's Gift Aid preference is captured at sign-up and applies to every renewal, so eligible donations are recorded for Gift Aid from the first payment onwards.
Limitations to be aware of
Recurring Donations is still in early development, so there are a few limitations to be aware of for now:
- Customers can't change the amount of a recurring donation. To give a different amount, the existing donation needs to be cancelled and a new one set up at the new amount.
- Customers can update their card details if a renewal payment fails, but not ad-hoc yet (for example, ahead of a card expiring).
- Recurring donations can't be prompted as part of the checkout flow, because a recurring donation is always taken on its own and can't sit in a cart alongside a ticket order. The one-off version (if available) will still be prompted.
- Recurring donations can't be purchased using Direct Debit at the Box Office.
- The allow price override option, which allows customers to enter their own donation amount, is not available for recurring donations - customers must choose from the suggested prices you've configured.
- If you want to offer recurring options and allow customers to choose their own donation amount for a one-off donation product, you'll currently need to set up two donation products: one with the recurring options, and a separate one-off product with Allow price override enabled.
- (We're working on allowing custom one-off amounts on the same product as recurring options, so this two-product set-up won't be needed in future.)
Setting up a recurring donation product
Recurring options are configured on the donation product itself. You can add recurring options to an existing donation product, or create a brand-new one.
To create a new donation product with both one-off and recurring options:
1. Go to Manage > Products.
2. Click Add New +.
3. First, complete the details for your donation:
- Product type - select Donation product.
- Name - the name of the donation, e.g. 'Support Our Venue'.
- Comment - this text is displayed online and gives extra information about the donation.
- Active product? and Can be sold? - enable these so the product is live and available for sale.
4. Choose the purchase options the donation offers: One-off, Monthly and/or Yearly. At least one must be selected.
5. Add your suggested Prices. You can drag these to reorder them, and customers pick from them when donating.
Notes
If you want to offer recurring options and allow the customer to choose their own amount for a one-off donation, you'll currently need to set up two donation products: one with the recurring options, and a separate one-off product with Allow price override enabled.
We're working on allowing custom one-off amounts on the same product as recurring options, so this two-product set-up won't be needed in future.
You can still edit a donation product's prices after it has active recurring donations against it, including removing a price option. Changes only affect new purchases: existing recurring donations carry on at the amount and frequency their donors signed up to.
6. Next, add a couple of Tags:
- Add the 'prompt' tag so the one-off version of your donation is prompted during online checkout. Recurring donations aren't prompted (they're always taken on their own), so this only affects one-off giving.
- Add a tag so you can filter sales reports for this product, e.g. 'donation'.
- If you're in the UK and want to offer Gift Aid on this donation product, also add the 'giftaid' tag. This injects the Gift Aid option into the checkout online and at the Box Office.
7. Click Add to save.
8. You can now add an image if you wish to.
Your recurring donation is now available for sale online and at the Box Office.
Online view
Here you can see that recurring and one-off donations are grouped separately, even when all the options are set up under the one donation product. Recurring donation options are split out and highlighted at the top of the page to encourage regular giving.
Box Office view
Here you can see that both one-off and recurring donation options for one donation product are listed under the one donation product, and selectable via a dropdown.
How customers donate online on your Ticketsolve website
Customers set up a recurring donation from your donations page. As with any recurring purchase, they'll need an online account, and they can log in or register at checkout:
1. The customer chooses a donation from your donations page, where recurring and one-off donations are grouped.
2. They pick their amount from the suggested prices and choose how often to give.
3. A recurring donation goes into its own cart, separate from any tickets, and the customer proceeds through checkout.
4. During checkout, they're prompted to log in or create an online account.
5. They set their Gift Aid preference if it's not already set. (If Gift Aid is already set on their customer record, this step is skipped.)
6. The customer then reaches the payment window. Here, they can access your terms & conditions before paying. (If you want to add anything specifically about recurring donations here, you'll need to edit your public website terms and conditions snippet. There's more on this in our guide on how to update your Terms and Conditions.)
7. Then they choose to pay their recurring donation by Card or Direct Debit.
Paying by card
On the payment screen, the customer enters their card details as usual. These are the details used for the recurring monthly or yearly payments. Once payment is confirmed, the customer sees a confirmation page linking to their new donation in their account.
Paying by Direct Debit
Direct Debit uses a short mandate set-up with our payment provider:
1. On the payment screen, the customer selects the Direct Debit option.
2. They enter their postal address and IBAN (ROI) or Sort Code & Account Number (UK).
3. They tick the box to confirm they're authorised to set up the Direct Debit, then click Set Up.
4. A page lets them know they'll be directed to complete the Direct Debit set-up. They click Confirm.
5. They're taken to a Mangopay Direct Debit / SEPA Mandate page, where they authorise the Direct Debit to complete set-up. They can download a copy of their digitally signed mandate here if they'd like to.
6. Once they click Confirm on the mandate page, set-up is complete and they're returned to your Ticketsolve website with the standard order confirmation page.
Notes
A customer can't purchase the same recurring donation twice. A second attempt is blocked before payment.
Taking recurring donations at the Box Office
Your box office team can set customers up with a recurring donation directly in Box Office.
1. In Box Office, first add a customer to the cart.
2. Before selling the recurring donation, open the customer record to confirm the customer has an online account. This is shown by the Membership toggle being switched on (blue), along with the date their online account was created.
If the customer doesn't have an online account, switch the Membership toggle to on and make sure the customer receives an email with a link to create their online account.
3. You're now ready to sell the recurring donation.
4. Go to the Products tab, find the correct donation product and click to open the product selector.
5. In the pop-up box, complete the following fields:
- Pick the customer's desired donation amount from the suggested prices.
- Choose how often they want to give from the purchase options dropdown.
- The Select a customer field is pre-populated as long as you already have a customer in the cart, so there's nothing to do here.
- Select the customer's Gift Aid preference (if applicable). If the customer already has a Gift Aid preference set on their record, this is pre-populated, so there's nothing to do.
6. When complete, click Continue.
7. You'll now be in the payment window, where you can enter the card details the customer wants the recurring donation taken from. Direct Debit can't be processed at the Box Office, so to pay by Direct Debit the customer needs to set up their recurring donation through your Ticketsolve website.
8. You'll see a confirmation pop-up letting you know the order is complete.
Managing recurring donations
Recurring donations renew automatically and charge the customer's card or Direct Debit unless they're cancelled. Renewals can be managed and cancelled by the customer in their online account, or by your team at the Box Office.
Auto-renewal of the recurring donation
Every month or year after the recurring donation purchase, it will auto-renew by attempting to charge the customer's card or by Direct Debit. If the payment is successful, the donation renews for another month or year.
What happens when the auto-renewal fails
If payment can't be taken (for example, because the customer's card has expired), the auto-renewal is recorded as unsuccessful, and the following happens:
1. The customer is sent the Donation Soft Failure email template, letting them know the payment has failed, that we'll try again soon, and linking them to their online account to update their card details.
2. The system retries the payment every four days, up to a total of five retries.
3. If the customer updates their card details at any point during this flow and a payment is successful, the recurring donation renews as normal.
4. If the payment is still unsuccessful after the final retry, the customer is sent the Donation Hard Failure email template, letting them know their donation has failed, with guidance on how to reactivate it.
Managing recurring donations in the Box Office
To view a customer's recurring donations, go to the customer record and open the Memberships & Donations tab. Here, one-off benefits, rolling memberships, and recurring donations each show as a single card.
To manage a customer's recurring donation, click the 3 dots on the recurring donation card. A side panel loads, where you can:
- Change the next recurring donation payment date by selecting a new date from the calendar.
- View the payment details.
- View the date the recurring donation first started.
- Add and view comments - click the eye icon to view system/hidden comments.
- See the Order History - every payment or order the donation has generated.
- Reset payment attempts if a renewal payment has failed and the customer wants to try again. (This option only shows when a payment is in the 'failed' stage.)
Cancelling a recurring donation at the Box Office
1. From the customer's Memberships & Donations tab, click the 3 dots.
2. Select Cancel.
3. In the pop-up, confirm that you want to cancel recurring donation.
Viewing all recurring donations
To see every recurring payment in one place, go to Customers > Recurring Payments.
This lists recurring donations alongside rolling memberships, so you can find and manage them from a single view.
On this page, you can filter by:
- Customer name
- Renewal date
- Product - select the recurring donation or rolling membership product you want to view
- Status (e.g. active, failed)
- Payment method - select card or Direct Debit
How customers manage their recurring donations on your Ticketsolve website
Customers with recurring donations have their own My Donations page in their account, with a donation icon in the account menu. To access this:
1. They go to your Ticketsolve website and log in. The login option is available from any page, but you can also direct them to the /login page, e.g. https://[myvenue].ticketsolve.com/ticketbooth/login.
2. Once logged in, they click their profile and select My Donations from the dropdown list.
3. From here, they can see all their recurring donations along with the amount, frequency and next payment date.
Cancelling a recurring donation online
1. From their My Donations page, the customer finds the recurring donation they want to cancel.
2. They click See Details, which opens their recurring donation.
3. From there, they click Cancel Donation.
4. A pop-up asks them to confirm the cancellation.
5. Once cancelled, the recurring donation stays listed in their My Donations view but displays as cancelled.
Reactivating a cancelled recurring donation
A cancelled recurring donation can be reactivated at any time before the end of the current billing period.
To reactivate a cancelled donation and resume giving, the customer clicks Reactivate Donation from their online account. The same payment method is used.
Notes
If you'd rather customers didn't cancel online, the Subscription cancel box office only setting (Settings > General Settings) applies to recurring donations. With this setting enabled, customers see a message directing them to contact the box office instead of a cancel option.
Email templates
Recurring donations come with additional email templates for payment failures and cancellation confirmations.
We've provided default content for each, and you can customise them. All templates follow your account's system email styling (matching the checkout mailer, pre-event alert, etc.)
These templates are:
- Donation cancellation - sent when the customer cancels their recurring donation.
- Donation hard failure - sent when a payment has failed and has reached the maximum number of retries.
- Donation soft failure - sent when a payment has failed but will be retried.
- Donation uncancellation - sent when a customer has cancelled their recurring donation, but then decides to reactivate it within the time period before it fully expires.
You can preview these by going to Settings > Email templates > find the relevant template > click Preview. A pop-up will load showing you an example of the email.
Renewal reminders
There isn't a renewal reminder built specifically for recurring donations yet. In the meantime, the Subscription Renewal automation set up for memberships isn't limited to memberships: left on its default of All Benefit Products, it also sends a reminder to recurring donation holders whose renewal falls due, using the membership reminder template.
To use it, go to Manage > Automations, open the New Automations tab and set up a Subscription Renewal Reminders automation, leaving Benefit Product set to All Benefit Products. The full walkthrough is in the Rolling Memberships guide.
Notes
Because this uses the membership reminder template, the wording is written for memberships. Check it reads sensibly for a donation before enabling it.
Frequently asked questions
The recurring options only show when your account is on Ticketsolve Pay and recurring donations have been enabled, and when the donation product has been configured with recurring purchase options. If you only see One-off, either the product hasn't been given any recurring options or your account isn't set up for recurring donations yet. Get in touch with our Support team if you'd like it switched on.
No. A recurring donation is always taken on its own and paid for there and then. A one-off donation is different: it's added to the regular cart and checked out alongside everything else. At the Box Office, any tickets already in the cart are kept, with the same customer selected, so you can finish that order straight after.
Not directly. The amount set at sign-up is taken on every renewal. To move to a new amount, cancel the existing recurring donation and set up a new one.
Customers can cancel from their My Donations page on your Ticketsolve website, where they'll be asked to confirm before the cancellation goes through. Your team can also cancel on a customer's behalf from the customer's Memberships & Donations tab in Box Office. Either way, no further payments are taken once the donation is cancelled, and it can be reactivated later if the customer changes their mind. If you've turned on the Subscription cancel box office only setting, customers can't cancel online and are directed to contact the box office instead.
Yes, online. Direct Debit is available as a payment method at checkout on your Ticketsolve website, alongside credit card. At the Box Office, recurring donations are taken by card.
The system automatically retries the payment every four days, up to five attempts. If it still can't be taken after the fifth attempt, the donation is marked as failed. Your team can reset the payment attempts from the customer's Memberships & Donations tab in Box Office so it can be tried again, and the customer can update their card details from their account.
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