Updating a donor's details after they give

A donor typo'd their email at checkout. A receipt bounced. A gift from "J. Smth" needs to read "Jonathan Smith" before you send thank-yous. Fixing donor details on an existing donation takes under a minute — but a couple of follow-ups (especially around receipts) are easy to miss. Here's the complete routine.

This article focuses on who the donor is — name, email, phone, dedication. For amounts, dates, statuses, and team credit, see Editing or correcting a donation.

What you can change

On any donation — online, phone, manual, or imported — you can edit:

• First and last name (or the full name)
• Email address
• Phone number
• Dedication text — the "in honor / in memory" message shown with the gift

You need donation-editing permission on the campaign. Open the Donations tab, find the gift, choose Edit from its actions menu, update the fields, and save. Political campaigns can also correct the donor's compliance answers (address, employer details) the same way.

What happens — and doesn't — when you save

Donor-detail edits are deliberately quiet:

• Totals don't move. Changing who a gift is from never changes what it's worth — your campaign total, team totals, and progress bar are untouched.
• The public feed isn't re-announced. The display name updates in place; the gift doesn't reappear at the top of the feed as if it were new.
• No email goes out automatically. Correcting an email address does not re-send the receipt on its own — that's a separate, deliberate step (next section). This protects you from accidentally spamming a donor with a fresh receipt for every small edit.

Getting the receipt to the corrected address

The most common reason for editing donor details is a bounced or missing receipt. The full fix is two steps:

1. Edit the donation and correct the email address. Save.
2. Open the same row's actions menu and choose Resend Receipt. A fresh PDF receipt is generated and emailed to the corrected address — you'll see a confirmation that it's been queued.

A resend works whenever the donation is in a successful status. It's not available when:

• The donation is Pending, Failed, or Refunded — receipts only exist for completed gifts.
• There's no email on file — add one via Edit first, then resend. Anonymous gifts with an email on file receive receipts and can be resent like any other donation.

Tip: Manual and imported donations often arrive without an email address. Whenever a donor asks for a receipt on one of these, it's the same two-step: add their email via Edit, then Resend Receipt.

Common scenarios

"My receipt went to my old work email." Edit the email, resend the receipt. Done.

"Please make my donation anonymous." Anonymity is about public display — if a donor asks after the fact, edit the donation so their name no longer appears publicly, and confirm with them how they're now shown in the feed. Their real details stay on your private record, and their receipt is unaffected.

"The dedication has a typo." Edit the dedication text; the public feed shows the corrected message in place.

"Can you change whose name the gift is under?" Yes — names are editable on every donation. Keep in mind the receipt reflects the donor details at the time it's generated, so if tax documentation matters, correct the name first, then resend the receipt so their paperwork matches.

What this can't do

Donor-detail edits never touch the money side. The amount, currency, and payment method of an online gift remain locked to what was actually charged, and moving a gift's team credit or date follows the rules in Editing or correcting a donation. If the payment itself is the problem, the answer is a refund — see Refunds — what happens when you refund a donation.