Using a recurring gift type vs. a recurring gift batch for payroll deductions

Shelby McNabb

Hi everyone! 

I am about to start recording my organization's staff giving payroll deductions in Raiser's Edge and I wanted some advice on best practices. I know that I can do this through a recurring gift batch - and re-commit the batch each pay period. But should I do that AND enter the gifts using the recurring gift type?

I currently use recurring gifts for our monthly donors whose gifts I have to record and run their credit cards each month. What are the differences between how you process those donations and how you process payroll deductions? 

Any advice would be helpful! Thank you! 

John Heizer

Our staff giving payroll deductions are a one-year commitment, therefore have a known fixed total amount for the year, so they are entered as a Pledge for the total amount signs their pledge form.  Payments toward the Pledges are posted monthly using a recurring Batch.


Recurring Gifts are intended for ongoing giving with no fixed total amount, which doesn't apply in our case, but might in yours if your staff expects to give every paycheck with no fixed amount or end date.

JoAnn Strommen

Seconding what John Heizer‍ does/said. Our staff gifts for payroll deduction are by our definition pledges: set amount, generally over set amount of time. I have two staff members with recurring gifts - keep deducting as long as they are employed. Our payroll is processed every two weeks based on list supplied by HR. 


Years ago I processed payroll via a recurring batch. After reading some posts on the forums I switched, liked it and have never gone back to recurring batch. I use a new gift batch, go to Tools > Auto generate, apply a record criteria to use my query of employees with payroll gifts and voila the batch is generated with all who have payments due/balances on pledge. There are two main reasons I prefer this method:

1. I don't have to re-enter any employees who were removed the previous pay period due to lack of a check. I just need to skim through the list and remove any employees not receiving a check for this pay period. (I jot names down and can check with HR to see if they are no longer employed and pledge should be written off.)
2. There is a batch record that can be viewed should there be any questions. With a recurring batch all you can see in batch history (yes you can query on gifts with that batch #) is batch #. You can't see the gifts (unless they've finally made that improvement).

You can find other threads on this topic by searching forum, too. And you will find orgs that use recurring gift for their employee pledges.

Shelby McNabb

Thank you, that is helpful !

Dariel Dixon 2

You should not be using the recurring gift type for your payments.  Payments should be entered as cash and applied to the existing recurring gifts.  You don't want to create multiple recurring gift templates.

Shelby McNabb

Thank you - do you know how can I apply gifts to the initial recurring gift using a recurring batch? Would I enter the gift type as recurring gift pay-cash? Or just cash? And then will it operate like a pledge where I receive a pop-up?

Dariel Dixon 2

Shelby McNabb:

Thank you - do you know how can I apply gifts to the initial recurring gift using a recurring batch? Would I enter the gift type as recurring gift pay-cash? Or just cash? And then will it operate like a pledge where I receive a pop-up?

Just cash.  Make sure you have the checkbox for automatically applying to pledges and recurring gifts checked though.


I don't think a pop-up is displayed for recurring gifts, just pledges and memberships.  I don't know if it is a business rule or not.