Refunds — what happens when you refund a donation

Sometimes a gift needs to go back — a duplicate charge, a donor's change of heart, or an amount entered wrong at an event. Pledgix handles real card refunds for Stripe donations and bookkeeping refunds for everything else.

Who can refund

Refunding moves money, so it's reserved for the campaign's top role — a campaign super admin (and Pledgix staff). Managers who can edit donations but don't hold the refund permission won't see the option succeed.

Refunding a donation

1. Open your campaign's Donations tab and find the donation.
2. Open the row's actions menu and choose the refund action.
3. Confirm in the dialog.

Only Approved (completed) donations can be refunded. Donations that are already refunded, disputed, or charged back can't be refunded again — you'll see a message explaining why.

What actually happens

It depends on how the donation was paid:

• Stripe donation — Pledgix instructs Stripe to return the full amount to the donor's card. You'll see a confirmation like "Card refunded via Stripe; campaign totals updated." The money typically appears back on the donor's statement within 5–10 business days, depending on their bank. If the charge has an open dispute at Stripe, the refund is blocked until the dispute resolves.
• Other online donation (the standard Pledgix rail) — the refund action marks the record Refunded and updates your totals, but no money moves through Pledgix. Issue the actual refund from your payment gateway; refunds issued at the gateway sync back to your Pledgix records automatically.
• Manual or offline donation — no money moves through Pledgix (you return it yourself, e.g. by voiding a check). The record is simply marked Refunded: "Donation marked refunded; campaign totals updated."

In every case, immediately after the refund action:

• The donation's status changes to Refunded.
• Your campaign total decreases by the gift amount, and any team it was credited to is adjusted too.
• The gift disappears from the public donations feed (only Approved donations are shown).
• The record moves to your Pending / Failed / Refunds tab, so you keep the full history.

Partial refunds, disputes, and chargebacks

Some refund activity starts at the payment processor rather than in your dashboard:

• Partially Refunded — a portion of the charge was returned at the processor. Pledgix picks this up automatically and adjusts your totals for the refunded portion.
• Disputed — the donor's bank has opened an inquiry into the charge. The donation is flagged while the dispute runs its course.
• Charged Back — the donor's bank reversed the charge. The donation is removed from your totals automatically.

All of these arrive via secure notifications from the payment processor — you don't need to do anything for your Pledgix records to stay in sync. Each of these statuses is filterable in your Donations dashboard.

Tip: Chargebacks are expensive and hurt your processing reputation. If a donor contacts you unhappy about a charge, refunding promptly from your dashboard is almost always better than letting it become a bank dispute.

What the donor receives

Pledgix doesn't email the donor about the refund automatically — the payment processor and the donor's bank handle the money trail on their statement. If you'd like to confirm personally, the donor's email address is right on the donation record.