Converting Recurring gifts into NXT

Aldera Chisholm 2

Hi all,

We have been using NXT, but continue (almost) all our gift entry in Database view. 


However, I'm intrigued by the idea of converting our recurring gifts over - has anyone done this that can help with some tips and tricks? I'm not sure yet whether it's worth doing, as clicking through one-by-one 200+ gifts sounds like a time-drain, but it would be nice to not have to deal with the recurring batch in Database view constantly.  We process all our gifts on the 15th of each month, currently.


Anyone have Pro/Cons to share?


Cheers

Aldera



 

Karen Stuhlfeier

We have been processing them in NXT web view for a year now and I haven't had any problems. It works great. Once you convert them you'll save so much time each month. You just go in and approve the batch and you're done. The batch shows up in the database view. There is a section in Batch called Web View Batches where you can find them. In order to have documentation for the batch I can process a validation report from the database.

Aldera Chisholm 2

Hi Karen,

Thanks for your reply... If you have people who auto-process on different days, does it create a separate batch for each day? 


Thanks!

Daniel R. Snyder

Aldera Chisholm‍, we have converted ours over and admittedly it is not as many as you have, but it has been great to have them just auto process. Also, it will create separate batches for each day cards auto-process.


Here are a couple of things we found, not deal breakers, just to be aware of.


1. The NXT batches are not customizable so we cannot use the validation report as we typically do since it does not have fund id on it. A simple fix to just create an export with the information we need, but just wanted to share.


2. Check the schedule on your recurring gifts. We used to process on the 15th and 30th and used the Auto-generate transactions feature in batch to get the transactions we needed to charge. Because we only ran them on those set days we found a couple of gifts where our schedule was not set for the specific date, but between the 15th and 30th so they could come in on the 30th. However, when we upgraded one of the gifts, it began charging on the 23rd instead of the 30th. 


These are two things that are pretty unique to our organization so they may not apply to you at all but wanted to share. Overall, I would say go for it and enjoy that you don't have to manually charge them on the 15th of every month!

Aldera Chisholm 2

Thanks Dan - Great points.


Yes, we have only run ours on the 15th, and I have a sinking feeling that the schedules within the Recurring Gift wouldn't necessarily be set to that because the data person before me set up our Recurring Gifts using Recurring Batches that would just be run on the 15th, so I would likely need to go into every gift and check the schedule first as it would have defaulted to the day the gift was set up. 


December is a terrible time to think about starting new projects, so maybe I'll put this in the calendar for the quiet days at the end of January and start slogging through! 


Cheers

Lynnette Fisher

Hi Aldera,


I converted my recurring gifts to NXT back in July and LOVE IT.  Previously we processed all ours on the 1st of the month and it was a long process with lots of clicks.  It was a slight pain to have to convert them all individually, but the payout was so worth it.  They run automatically, then you can access them to check the entries before approving the batch.  Also, if you use the NXT donation forms and someone chooses to give a recurring gift they can pick the date they want because it will now run automatically and you don't have to worry about missing one because the donor wanted it on a different day.  I haven't regretted the move in the least!  Hope that helped.

Aldera Chisholm 2

Hi Lynnette Fisher‍ 

Thanks for the reply. We are in Canada so we can't use NXT forms (yet?) but it's good to know that those do integrate well, if and when we do get access to that feature.


This week we decided to run our first ever monthly donor upgrade ask as we have a new program that lends itself beautifully to an incremental ask, and seven donors have already upgraded. (While that may not sound like a lot, we're calling it a success since it's our first one). I think I will try putting all those donors into the automated recurring as sort of my "test batch."


Thanks everyone!

Ali


 

Aldera Chisholm 2

Oh a follow up question! Is there a nice way to create either a query or list that will pull only gifts that are Recurring using Automation in NXT? I can't pull all Recurring gifts, as they aren't all via NXT. In retrospect, thinking perhaps I need to put an attribute on these. I did a few to test, and I see them in the automatic batch, which is great. But, it would be nice to be able to pull them into a list for some reporting, and not based on batch, so that I can pull them all, regardless of which date they process.

Sandy Vaughn

@Lynnette Fisher
You said it was hard to covert them individually, but how do you do it? Only instructions I received was go to Convert to automated recurring gift and I can't find that anywhere in RE.

Austen Brown

@Sandy Vaughn - Here are instructions on how to convert a manual recurring gift to an automatic one in WV: