Trellis

Set up giving

Turn on Giving, connect the church's bank account through Stripe, set up funds, and open the giving page.

Giving lets people give online, once or on a schedule, and keeps every gift in one place, including cash and checks from the plate. Money goes straight to the church's own bank account through Stripe. Trellis never holds it.

An admin does the setup. After that, admins and people with the Finance role run Giving day to day.

Turn on Giving

Giving is a paid part. An admin turns it on under Church settings, then Parts and billing. See Turn parts on, and the Pricing page for what it costs.

When Giving comes on, Trellis makes one fund for you, General Fund, so the first gift has somewhere to go.

Connect the church's bank account

Online gifts need a Stripe account for the church. Paid sign-ups in Registration use the same one, so it lives in church settings, not in Giving.

  1. Open Church settings, then Payments.
  2. Press Connect the church's bank account.
  3. Stripe asks for the church's legal name, EIN, an address, a bank account, and who is filling it in. Finish the steps on Stripe's pages.
  4. When Stripe sends you back, Trellis checks the account. The chip next to Bank account says Connected, Under review or Incomplete.

If it says Incomplete, press Finish with Stripe to give Stripe what it still needs. If it says Under review, Stripe is looking at the account; press Check status later to see where it stands.

Already on Stripe through another giving tool? If you see Use a Stripe account the church already has, press it, sign in to Stripe and approve Trellis. Your past payments and payouts stay on that account.

Ask Stripe for the nonprofit rate

Once the account is connected, Payments shows a section called Lower card fees. Stripe offers churches a lower card rate, but the church has to ask for it.

  1. Press Copy the email.
  2. Fill in anything in brackets.
  3. Send it to Stripe from the email address your Stripe account signs in with.

Stripe replies by email. The rates themselves are listed on the Payments page, under Fees.

Set up your funds

Every gift lands in a fund. Open Giving, then Funds, and add the ones you use, such as Building or Missions. The default fund is the one the giving page offers first. See Gifts and funds.

Open the giving page

  1. Open Giving, then Settings. (Only admins see this tab.)
  2. Under The giving page, tick The giving page is live.
  3. If you like, tick Let givers cover the processing fee. Givers then see a box they can tick to add the fee to their gift. It's off until they tick it, and the added amount counts as part of their gift.
  4. Add A line at the top of the page if you want one.
  5. Under Statements, enter the church's EIN. It prints on year-end statements.
  6. Press Save.

You can't tick The giving page is live until the Stripe account is connected and approved. The box tells you what's still missing.

Share the giving page

On the same Settings tab, the Hand out the giving page card gives you:

  • The link, with Copy. Put it in the bulletin, an email or on a Give button.
  • A ready-made Give button and an embed for the church website, each with Copy.
  • A QR code, to download as PNG for a slide or a bulletin, or SVG for print.

Above them, choose what the link lands on: a Fund, an Amount, and Once, or their choice or Monthly. The link and the QR code both carry those choices, so a building campaign's QR code can open straight on the Building fund. Nobody needs to sign in to give.

What givers see

The giving page shows your church's name and logo, a few amounts to pick from or any other amount, the fund (if you have more than one active fund), and how often: One time, Monthly, Weekly or Yearly. They give their name and an email for their giving record, then pay on Stripe's page.

Trellis matches each gift to a person by email. If nobody in People has that email, Trellis adds them, so their gifts have somewhere to go at year end.

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