Duration of pledges

Paul Williams

As a new user to Online Express I have one area of frustration relating to pledges. For larger pledge amounts there does not appear to be any real control over the length of time someone can pledge. OE seems to have an upper limit that would allow pledges to be carried over a period of 100 months or even 100 years which really is too long. It would be great if the user could control the length of time a pledge could run for. It would be great if Blackbaud could fix this issue. Does anyone else share the same frustration or know of a way around this?

Stephanie Ulmer

I did not see this loop hole but you are absolutely right. This is a real problem. Our organization only books pledges for a maximum of 5 years. Our board approves schedules for donors that wish to go beyond that time frame.



I hope they consider fixing this immediately.

Candace Chesler

We share this concern - definitely need to limit the number of months/years that a donor can commit for their pledge.  Our small workaround is to add text to the Pledge Duration line of the donation form to indicate that the Pledges must be completed by X Date.  

But - we've also noticed that pledge payments must be at least $10.  If I say I'm going to pledge $50 - I only get a maximum of five months to pay off that pledge.  But - for the larger amounts - donors can have up to 100 months to pay.  Would love to be able to place our own end date on pledges.



 

Paul Williams

Stephanie Ulmer:

I did not see this loop hole but you are absolutely right. This is a real problem. Our organization only books pledges for a maximum of 5 years. Our board approves schedules for donors that wish to go beyond that time frame.



I hope they consider fixing this immediately.

Thanks for your reply Stephanie, 5 years certainly sounds the right sort of timeline that we would ideally work to. It would be great if Blackbaud could fix this.

 

Paul Williams

Candace Chesler:

We share this concern - definitely need to limit the number of months/years that a donor can commit for their pledge.  Our small workaround is to add text to the Pledge Duration line of the donation form to indicate that the Pledges must be completed by X Date.  

But - we've also noticed that pledge payments must be at least $10.  If I say I'm going to pledge $50 - I only get a maximum of five months to pay off that pledge.  But - for the larger amounts - donors can have up to 100 months to pay.  Would love to be able to place our own end date on pledges.



Thanks for this Candace, I think your suggesting of adding some text under the pledge duration line would be one way to try and address this. Pledge end dates would also be useful if the end date didn't stretch out too far.

 

Mandy Valentine 2

Paul Williams:

Stephanie Ulmer:

I did not see this loop hole but you are absolutely right. This is a real problem. Our organization only books pledges for a maximum of 5 years. Our board approves schedules for donors that wish to go beyond that time frame.


I hope they consider fixing this immediately.

Thanks for your reply Stephanie, 5 years certainly sounds the right sort of timeline that we would ideally work to. It would be great if Blackbaud could fix this.

 

 

I see this is an old thread, but I am trying to set up pledges for a capital campaign and the max months it shows is 50. It won't even let me do 5 years (60 payments). Anyone else have this problem?

Cheryl Corwin

Paul Williams:

As a new user to Online Express I have one area of frustration relating to pledges. For larger pledge amounts there does not appear to be any real control over the length of time someone can pledge. OE seems to have an upper limit that would allow pledges to be carried over a period of 100 months or even 100 years which really is too long. It would be great if the user could control the length of time a pledge could run for. It would be great if Blackbaud could fix this issue. Does anyone else share the same frustration or know of a way around this?

Agreed with this - this is an oversight in design. Blackbaud needs to allow users to set limits on number of years, otherwise this function is useless. Please amend so we can use this function. 

Rochelle Toomer

Mandy Valentine:

Paul Williams:

Stephanie Ulmer:

I did not see this loop hole but you are absolutely right. This is a real problem. Our organization only books pledges for a maximum of 5 years. Our board approves schedules for donors that wish to go beyond that time frame.


I hope they consider fixing this immediately.

Thanks for your reply Stephanie, 5 years certainly sounds the right sort of timeline that we would ideally work to. It would be great if Blackbaud could fix this.

 

 

I see this is an old thread, but I am trying to set up pledges for a capital campaign and the max months it shows is 50. It won't even let me do 5 years (60 payments). Anyone else have this problem?

 

Yes this is a frustratring issue for us. We are also running a 5-year capital campaign.  It does have to do with the minimum pledge payment amount you set up in tab 2. Extras.  So, Pledge amount divdied by 60 months = minimum payment, and that will fix your dropdown box issue so it says 60 months.  HOWEVER, if you change to quarterly OR annually it will still go up to 60.  60 years?!  That's ricidulous.   .  

Dan Junkins

Hi everyone, just wanted to update this thread as I've been looking into a bit more and saw this workaround in an Idea Bank thread.  Please find that idea and vote for it.  There is a way to get it to function properly, if you can select just one of them.  Here's how it's done:  

1. You have to use donation amount buttons.
2. Choose only one pledge type: Annual, Quarterly, or Monthly 
3. Divide each donation amount by your maximum installment # and enter that as the minimum payment amount.
4. Other Amounts won't work, it just grabs the highest # from the the others. You'd have to eliminate Other or accept as better than nothing.
5. You'll need to adjust the minimums each month or quarter to drop the # of installments by 1.

Hope this works for some of you!


Dan