Turn donor trust into funding — on the same platform that keeps your volunteers safe.
Collect one-time, monthly, and yearly gifts on your own branded donation page, paid straight to your nonprofit's bank account. Every fee is disclosed to the donor before they give — never a hidden "tip" — and helps fund the background-screening, compliance, policies, and waivers tools built into the same account.
Why it's built different
A donate button is easy. Donor trust is the hard part.
Anyone can collect a payment. VolunteerBadge is built so a donor can see exactly what happens to their gift — and give to an organization that screens the people it serves.
Every fee, in the open — before they give
No pre-checked “tip,” no fine print. The donor sees the gift, the estimated card fee, and VolunteerBadge's small platform fee right on the page — and can choose to cover it so 100% reaches you.
Verified nonprofits only
Before a page goes live, the admin passes identity verification and the org is matched to a real IRS EIN — so donors aren't giving into a void.
Your brand, four ways
Modern, Warm, Bold, or Minimal — with your logo, story, hero media, and a shareable link and QR code.
One-time, monthly, yearly
The same preset amounts work across every cadence. Recurring donors are billed automatically until they cancel.
A goal that fills up
Set an optional target and a live “$X of $Y raised” bar appears on your page — or leave it off entirely.
The tax receipt writes itself
The instant a gift succeeds, the donor is emailed an IRS-compliant receipt — your organization's name, EIN, tax-exempt statement, and the required “no goods or services were provided” language. No manual work, no year-end scramble.
How it works
Three steps. Start to result.
Pick a style, set a goal, connect your bank
Choose one of four page styles, add your story and hero media, and optionally set a fundraising goal. Connect your own independent Stripe account — you're the merchant of record.
- EIN + identity verification required before going live
- Stripe, not VolunteerBadge, stands behind disputes
Your donation page
Modern
Warm
Bold
Minimal
How it compares
VolunteerBadge vs. the major donation platforms
GiveLively, Zeffy, Donorbox, and PayPal are all real, widely used options — this isn't a case where the competition is bad. The difference is what the fee actually pays for, how clearly it's shown to the donor, and whether the platform does anything at all to screen the people your donation ultimately protects.
| Capability | VolunteerBadge | Give Lively | Zeffy | Donorbox | PayPal |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Platform fee to your organization | 2% — shown before checkout | $0 platform fee | $0 platform fee | 2.95% (Standard plan) or 1.75–2% on paid plans ($150+/mo) | 2.89% + $0.49 via the standard Donate Button |
| How the fee actually reaches the donor | Itemized breakdown on the page, before they give — donor can opt to cover it | Card-processing cost (2.9% + $0.30) passed to the donor, by default | A pre-selected "voluntary" tip (15–17%) added at checkout, opt-out | Platform fee deducted from the gift, unless the donor opts to cover it | Deducted from the gift; a discounted 1.99% + $0.49 rate requires a separate charity checkout flow |
| One-time, monthly, and yearly giving | Recurring via PayPal subscriptions, not donation-specific | ||||
| Custom-branded donation page | |||||
| Integrated with background screening, compliance, waivers, applications & hours | |||||
| Nonprofit identity + EIN verification required to accept donations | Not publicly disclosed | Not publicly disclosed | Not publicly disclosed | Not publicly disclosed | |
| Funded by | A disclosed 2% fee, reinvested in the platform | Anonymous philanthropic donors | Donor tips (roughly 2 of 3 donors opt in) | Platform + processing fees | Processing fees (its core payments business) |
Why it's more than a donate button
None of the platforms above do any of this.
Donations sit in the same account as everything else VolunteerBadge already does for your organization — so the record system doesn't just process a gift, it backs up what you tell donors about who you screen and how you run.
Background screening
The same $5 check that clears a volunteer to serve is the check a donor can point to when asking "who is actually handling this money?"
Compliance roster
One live view of who's cleared to serve — the same record system, not a second spreadsheet, backs up what you tell donors about who's screened.
Participant waivers
E-signed waivers for the people you serve live in the same account as the gifts that fund serving them.
Volunteer applications
FCRA disclosure, authorization, and onboarding — already built, already compliant — for the volunteers a donor's gift ultimately supports.
Hour tracking & in-kind value
Verified volunteer hours convert into documented in-kind match value for the same grant reports your donations feed.
AI grant writing
Draft grant impact sections using your real, aggregate volunteer and donation data — one platform, one source of truth.
Security is the whole point, not an afterthought
The platforms above are payment tools that happen to serve nonprofits. VolunteerBadge is a background-screening platform that also happens to process donations — so your donors are giving to an organization that verifies its own leadership, screens its own volunteers, and treats protecting the people it serves as its actual core business, not a marketing line.
Where the 2% actually goes
A donation plus VolunteerBadge's small, disclosed fee is what keeps a $5 national background check possible for thousands of nonprofits across America. It helps fund the engineering, fraud prevention, and liability insurance behind a platform that runs FCRA-regulated consumer reports every day — not a payments-only tool with no screening obligations to carry.
Sources: Give Lively's published pricing and blog (givelively.org/pricing, givelively.org/blog); independent reporting and user feedback on Zeffy's default checkout tip (support.zeffy.com, donorbox.org, wpcharitable.com); Donorbox's published plan pricing (donorbox.org); and PayPal's published nonprofit transaction rates. Competitor fee structures and logos are trademarks of their respective owners and can change — verify current terms directly with each provider before switching.
FAQ
Common questions about Donations.
Is there really a fee — and how big is it?
Yes — a small platform fee (2% of the gift by default) that's shown to the donor in a live breakdown before they give, never hidden inside a "suggested tip" or added after the fact. Donors can optionally cover the fee themselves so 100% of their intended gift reaches your organization.
Why charge a fee at all if the other free perks don't?
Because Donations moves real money, unlike the other free perks. The fee is one of the ways we keep VolunteerBadge's background checks the most affordable in the industry — it helps cover the engineering, fraud-prevention, and liability insurance that comes with running a platform that handles both real funds and FCRA-regulated consumer reports. It's a small, transparent cut, not a hidden markup.
Who actually holds the money — VolunteerBadge or us?
You do. Donations are charged directly on your own, independent Stripe account — you're the merchant of record, so receipts come from your organization and it's clean for your own accounting — then paid straight to your bank. VolunteerBadge never holds donor funds, and Stripe (not VolunteerBadge) bears the loss if a payment is ever disputed.
Do donors get a tax receipt automatically?
Yes. The moment a gift succeeds, the donor is emailed a receipt with your organization's name, EIN, a tax-exempt status statement, and the IRS-required "no goods or services were provided" language.
How is this different from GiveLively, Zeffy, Donorbox, or PayPal?
See the full comparison below — in short, VolunteerBadge's fee is smaller than most, shown plainly before checkout rather than added as a "tip," and funds an integrated background-screening and compliance platform rather than a payments-only tool.
Donations is included with every account.
No subscription to turn it on. A small, fully disclosed platform fee applies per gift (shown to the donor before they give) — every other perk below, and the core screening platform, is $0 beyond your $5 per background check.