The PDF Receipts feature automatically generates a PDF for each online donation, offline donation, ticket purchase, and registration with which a donation was submitted. This PDF is sent to the donor as an attachment in the donation, ticket, or registration automated email. This feature can be enabled on any campaign site or standalone page and is part of the entity/inheritance system, meaning that it can be configured on an entity level to apply to multiple campaigns at once. Please contact Neon Fundraise support if you would like this feature enabled.
Feature Details
Auto Responders
PDF Receipts can be sent with most donation auto responders. The specific auto-responders are:
- Donation Confirmation
- Recurring Donation Instance Confirmation
- Offline Donation Verified
- Registration Confirmation (when a donation is submitted together with the registration)
- Ticket Purchased Confirmation
- Refund Confirmation
In the event of a partial refund on a donation, a new receipt will be generated and sent to the donor with the Refund Confirmation email. The new receipt includes the updated amount and a statement that it is a “replacement receipt.”
PDF Receipts are not sent for pledge donations.
Enabling or Disabling PDF Receipts
The PDF Receipts feature must be enabled by the Neon Fundraise support team. Please contact Neon Fundraise support if you would like this feature enabled. Once the feature is enabled, it's accessible in the Admin, under Email > PDF Receipt Template, on any entity level. There, the feature can be enabled or disabled for each action/auto-responder listed above, and the PDF template can be edited, among other settings. All settings are inherited by campaigns within the entity in which the configuration is made.
Advanced Settings
PDF Receipts can be configured with conditionals that determine whether the PDF Receipt will be attached to the relevant email. These conditionals are listed below the PDF template in the Admin. The included options are:
- Donors can opt out: a checkbox appears on the donation page allowing the donor to decline to receive a PDF receipt by email.
- Donors are opted out by default: used in conjunction with the above setting, it reverses the opt in so that all donors are opted out of receiving the PDF by default unless they actively check the checkbox on the donation form.
- Don't send PDF receipt for donations under: the PDF will not be attached to emails for donations that are under a given amount.
- Don't include processor fees in minimum amount calculation: this setting is used in conjunction with the above setting and determines whether to include fees covered by the donor when calculating the minimum donation amount. Recommended behavior is to include fees in the calculation, so that if the donation amount is greater than the minimum amount when counting the fees the donor covers, the PDF is attached to the resulting email.
- Always send tax receipt for company donations: This setting allows all the above conditionals to be ignored in the case of company donations — when the donation is a company donation, the PDF Receipt will always be attached to the email, regardless of the above configurations.
Administrators can also prevent the creation and sending of a PDF Receipt on an individual basis when adding a donation through the Admin.
PDF Locking
To comply with relevant laws in some locales, there is an option to lock the PDF from being edited by the user in PDF-editing software. If you would like to enable this feature, please contact us. Please be aware that this feature also has the somewhat negative effect of email providers not being able to scan the file for viruses and consequently presenting a message to be careful when downloading.
The PDF Receipt Template
Editing Your PDF Receipt
Once the feature is enabled, the PDF template can be edited in the Admin, under Email > PDF Receipt.
This feature was built as a way to provide tax receipts, but it may be used for other purposes. As a result, by default, the template includes the following:
- A statement that it is an official receipt for income tax purposes
- Name and address of the non profit
- Organization’s tax ID
- Unique donation ID
- Receipt issue date
- Donor’s full name and address
- Gift amount
- Message from organization to donor
Using Neon Fundraise’s standard text-editor, the template can be further customized as desired, for example to include the organization’s logo, a signature, and/or custom text. Placeholders may be used as well, just like in email templates. For gift amount, we recommend using the placeholder {{Eligible_Amount}}. This automatically calculates and returns the tax deductible amount for donations, tickets, and registration donations. For donations, this placeholder includes fees covered by the donor as part of the donation. To exclude fees covered by the donor from the tax deductible amount, you can use the placeholder {{Eligible_Amount_Without_Fees}}.
PDFs are generated in Letter size (8.5x11 in).
Accessing and Resending PDF Receipts
Donors can access previously generated PDFs in the user profile section, under Payments > Transactions. For administrators, previously generated PDFs can be found in the Admin on the donation record by clicking the button on top of the donation record. If any information has been changed, admins can re-generate the PDF by clicking the "Regenerate Receipt" option. Additionally, administrators can run the Transactions report to find PDF Receipt filenames as they are associated with individual donations, or the Donations report to find the PDF Receipt ID associated with each donation. This can be useful for organizations who store copies of the generated PDFs.
If an email that previously had a PDF Receipt associated with it is resent (from the Email > Sent Auto Responders tab), the PDF Receipt will be resent with the email. If the PDF was regenerated, the newer version will be attached to the resent email.