Introduction

This article looks at the process of using Importacular to import recurring gifts and their corresponding payments. The process is almost identical for pledges and pledge payments so we do not distinguish between them in this article. Unless otherwise highlighted the two are interchangeable in this document.


Terms Used

Raiser’s Edge does a poor job at distinguishing between a recurring gift template or schedule record and the payment record that is applied to it. The same can be said for a pledge and a pledge payment. The only distinguishing feature is that the gift type becomes “Pay-Cash” once applied to the RG or pledge.


For the sake of clarity, we refer to the recurring gift record which contains a schedule of how the donor will pay as “Recurring Gift Schedule” or “RG Schedule” for short.


We refer to the “Recurring Gift payment” record or “RG payment” as the application of a donation to schedule.


These are not widely used in Raiser’s Edge but will hopefully make the process simpler to understand in Importacular.


Process

It is not possible to import an RG Schedule and an RG payment on the same Importacular mapping template.  The RG Schedule needs to exist in RE before the payment can be applied to it.  Therefore, two separate mapping templates need to be created.


Creating the Recurring Gift Schedule Mapping (stage 1)

You can refer to this article for more information on Importing Recurring Gift or Instalment Schedules.


 

Creating the Recurring Gift Payment Mapping (stage 2)

Add a new mapping under Gift Mapping as you have done previously and map the fields based on how you wish the data to be imported. Example image below:



Depending on how you have set up your RG Schedule, you may also want to map the reference field on your payment (See this article for more information).


Once you have saved the template, double click on the Area Settings for the Gift Mapping:


Gifts Tab



Select ‘A recurring gift’ and then choose from the dropdown which mechanism you want to match (select 'A pledge) for looking to find a Pledge Schedule). The choices are:


First found – if there is just one active recurring gift on the constituent record this can be selected. If there are no active recurring gift schedules then the first inactive one will be selected.


If there are more than one active recurring gift schedules per constituent record, consider these other options:


Gift Attribute Description – When selecting this option Importacular will attempt to match an incoming attribute description with the corresponding value on a constituent record. You also need to select an attribute category from the second dropdown (as is seen in the example above). This is our recommended option.


Reference – Importacular will attempt to match a value mapped to the reference field with a value on the pledge or recurring gift schedule reference field.


Reference Number – As with Reference, Importacular will attempt to match against the reference number field. Note that this field only appears for specific pay methods. The pay method of the incoming payment need not be the same. 


Automatically copy the following fields to the payment

When processing payments, the incoming data might not always supply you with the fund, campaign, appeal, etc. If that is case, these Area Settings will transferred the selected values from the RG Schedule onto the payment. If you have ticked these boxes they will overwrite the mapping.


Choose which of the following fields you want copied to the payment:


  • Fund
  • Campaign
  • Appeal
  • Package
  • GiftAid Qualification Method (UK version of RE).
  • Bank
  • Soft Credit



Gift 2 Tab

The Gift 2 tab allows for more control on how the the gift should be handled for new or existing constituents as well as what to do with Appeals and Packages. It is all written in plain English and is not likely to be relevant to Recurring Gifts or Pledges payments:




Gift Matching Tab

The next tab asks whether you want to always import gifts regardless of whether a matching gift already exists. You can define your matching criteria here as well (eg. Date/Amount/Fund etc as seen below):



Missing Key Fields

By default, Importacular will ignore a Gift if Fund, Gift Date or Gift Amount are blank. Here you can change it so that an Exception will be created instead. Likewise, you can also choose to add a gift if the Incoming Gift Amount is 0 (not blank).


This tab is useful if you have a mixed batch of recurring gifts and regular gifts or if the recurring gift schedule are in the same file as the payments. This way if the recurring gift schedule already exists on RE it will not be created again.



Recurring Gifts Tab


The final tab is where you can define how to handle exceptions and Remaining Balances


If no match is found or if the amount is different, an exception can be generated.


There is also an editable field to specify the number of days difference which can be accepted (in the case where the transaction date is greater or less than the one specified). As alternative to raising an exception, you are able to skip the transaction so that the payment is applied to the correct date on the RG Schedule.



Remaining Balances

This section pertains to Pledges and how to handle payments under certain conditions. They are written in plain English, so should not need any further explanation.