Refunding a donation

GiveForms lets you refund a donation directly from the donation details panel. You can issue a full or partial refund, choose a reason, optionally send a refund receipt to the donor, and add an internal description.

Refunding a recurring donation refunds that specific payment only — it does not cancel the recurring plan. The donor's next scheduled installment will still process. To stop the plan itself, you'll need to do that separately.

Opening the refund modal

1. Open the Insights and Activity dashboard from the left navigation.
2. In the activity table, click the donation you want to refund. The donation details panel opens on the right.
3. In the top-right of the panel, click Refund Donation.

The Refund Donation modal opens with the donor's name, the original amount, and the payment method that will receive the refund.

Issuing the refund

In the modal:

1. Refund amount. The Refund field is pre-filled with the full donation amount. To issue a partial refund, change the amount to any value up to the original total.
2. Reason for Refund. Pick one from the dropdown:
   • Duplicate — the donor was charged twice for the same gift.
   • Fraudulent — the donation was made without the cardholder's authorization.
   • Other — anything not covered by the first two. Selecting Other reveals a Description field (up to 250 characters) where you can record context for your own records.
3. Email a refund receipt to donor. Check this if you want GiveForms to send the donor a receipt confirming the refund. Useful when the donor expects confirmation; some operators skip it for internal-only adjustments such as reversing a test transaction.
4. Click Refund Donation in red at the bottom of the modal.

The refund is submitted to the payment processor. Note the heads-up at the bottom of the modal: refunds may take up to 10 days to appear on a donor's statement. The exact timing depends on the donor's bank and card network and is outside GiveForms's control.

After the refund

When you reopen the donation in the activity dashboard, the details panel now shows:

• A REFUNDED badge next to the donation amount at the top.
• A new Refund Details section between Donation Details and Payment Details, with:
  • Refund Date — when the refund was issued.
  • Refunded By — the GiveForms user who issued it (their name and email).
  • Refund Amount — how much was refunded. For partial refunds this differs from the original donation amount.
  • New Net Donation — the donor's remaining contribution after the refund. $0 for full refunds; the leftover amount for partials.
  • Refund Reason — the reason you selected.
  • Description — the text you entered under Other, or "—" if none.

The Refund Details section has its own View Receipt button. Click it to see the refund receipt that was sent to the donor (if you checked the email option). The refund receipt is a separate document from the original donation receipt — both remain available. See Viewing and resending a receipt for how View Receipt and forwarding work.

Refunding recurring donations

Refunding a recurring donation refunds the specific installment you clicked — the one the donor was charged on that date. The recurring plan itself stays active, and the next scheduled installment will charge normally.

If the donor wants to stop future payments as well, the recurring plan needs to be deleted separately. See Managing a recurring donation.

How refunds affect insights

Refunds reduce Total Raised by the refunded amount. For partial refunds, the donation still contributes its remaining net amount to Total Raised. The refunded donation continues to appear in the activity table, with its original amount shown with a strikethrough to signal the refund.

For more on how Total Raised and other top-line insights are calculated, see Understanding your insights.