Importing donations from a spreadsheet

Moving from another platform, or entering a big batch of offline gifts? The donations import lets you upload an Excel or CSV file and create hundreds of donation records in one pass.

Before you start

• You need donation-editing permission on the campaign.
• Download the import template from the import dialog — it includes sample rows and a column guide, so it's the fastest way to get the format right.
• Imports are committed in small batches automatically, so even large files import progressively — a problem row rejects that row with a reason, not the whole file.

Preparing your file

Put your column headers in Row 1. Column order doesn't matter — Pledgix matches columns by header name, and the import dialog lets you review and correct the mapping before anything is saved. The key columns:

| Column | Notes | |---|---| | Donor Name | Required. Full name of the donor. | | Amount (or Base Amount) | Required. Numeric only, e.g. 100 or 100.50. | | Currency | Optional. Defaults to your campaign's currency. | | Status | completed, pending, failed, or refunded — defaults to completed. | | Payment Method | creditcard, banktransfer, cash, check, bit, applepay, googlepay, or other. | | Team Code | Optional. The team's code (e.g. 0012) to credit a team. | | Dedication / Message | Optional. Shown publicly with the gift. | | Anonymous | Yes or No. | | Transaction ID | Optional payment reference from another system. It's kept as a plain reference only — imported rows are always stored as manual entries, so a Payment Provider column is accepted but the rows never count as gateway-processed. | | Matched / Match Multiplier / Effective Amount | Optional matching info. | | Country / City | Optional. | | Notes | Internal only — never shown to donors. | | Date | MM/DD/YYYY or MM/DD/YYYY HH:MM. Blank = import time. |

Email and phone columns are optional but worth including — a donor needs an email on file to ever receive a receipt.

Running the import

1. Open your campaign's Donations tab and click Import.
2. Upload your file. Pledgix reads the headers, auto-detects the mapping, and flags anything it wasn't sure about so you can correct it.
3. Review the preview of parsed rows — donor names and amounts are shown so you can spot problems before committing.
4. Confirm the import. Rows missing a donor name or a valid amount are rejected with a clear reason; valid rows are created.

Imports are silent by default

An import is a batch of historical records, so by default it sends nothing: no donor receipts, no team notifications, no outside integrations are triggered. That protects you from blasting hundreds of donors with fresh receipts for old gifts. If you do want emails to go out, the import dialog has a checkbox to opt in before you run it.

What happens after import

• Rows imported with status completed count toward your campaign total and team totals immediately, and appear in the public donations feed (anonymous rows show as "Anonymous").
• Rows with a currency different from your campaign's goal currency are converted at the current exchange rate, so they count correctly toward your goal.
• Imported donations behave like manual donations afterwards: you can edit, refund-mark, or delete them, and send receipts to any donor with an email address (a manual Resend Receipt always works, even though the import itself sent none).

Tip: Keep dates accurate. Analytics and monthly breakdowns group donations by their donation date — if you leave the Date column blank, everything lands on the day you imported, which can make your giving timeline look strange.

Common issues

• "Missing amount" errors — make sure the amount column contains numbers only (no currency symbols or thousands separators in some locales).
• Team not credited — check that the Team Code column matches the code shown on your Teams page exactly.
• Header not recognized — use the mapping review step to point the column at the right field, or rename your header to match the template.