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Refund a Donation

Goal: Reverse a recorded donation when needed — donor request, error, fraud — so books, donor record, and receipt all reflect reality.

When refunds happen​

  • Donor changed their mind
  • Wrong amount was charged
  • Donation was applied to the wrong donor or fund
  • Fraud or chargeback initiated by the cardholder
  • A duplicate gift was processed by mistake

Current refund behavior​

Ayuna supports full void-and-reverse refunds for card-based donations. That means:

  • The full donation amount is refunded to the original payment method (credit/debit card)
  • The donation record is marked refunded
  • A reverse journal entry posts to the GL, zeroing out the original entry
  • The receipt is voided
  • The donor's lifetime giving and donation count update

Partial refunds are not currently supported in the UI. If a partial refund is needed, contact the donor to coordinate a path — usually full refund + new smaller donation.

ACH / bank-transfer refunds are blocked​

Refunds are not supported for ACH / bank-transfer donations. NACHA (the U.S. ACH network) does not provide a way for the originator to reverse a settled debit, so Ayuna will block the refund attempt with the message:

Refunds are not supported for ACH/bank transfer payments. ACH transactions cannot be reversed through the payment gateway.

When a donor needs their ACH gift returned, your team has to handle the money movement outside the system — typically by writing a check or initiating an ACH credit from your bank — and then record an offsetting transaction in your accounting system. The original donation record stays as-is.

If a donor disputes an ACH debit through their bank, that comes back as a dispute / chargeback rather than a refund, and is handled in the disputes flow with Finix.

Initiating a refund​

From the donation record:

  1. Open the donation
  2. Click Refund
  3. Confirm the reason from the predefined list (donor request, fraud, error, duplicate, other)
  4. Confirm

The system processes the refund through Finix for card-present and online card transactions. For check, cash, or ACH, the refund is recorded in Ayuna but you handle the actual money movement (issuing a check, sending a wire, etc.) outside the system. ACH-specific guidance is above.

What happens behind the scenes​

  • For Finix-processed transactions: the refund is sent to Finix and the transfer state tracks SUCCEEDED
  • For check/cash: just a record update; no external processing
  • The donor sees the refunded gift in their giving history with status Refunded

Refunds and recurring donations​

Refunding a single charge from a recurring schedule does not cancel the schedule. The next scheduled charge still attempts to process. If the donor wants to stop:

  1. Cancel the recurring donation first (preserves history)
  2. Then refund the most recent charge if requested

Doing it in the other order risks the next charge processing before the cancellation goes through.

Refunds and pledges​

Refunding a pledge payment is more involved:

  1. Refund the donation as usual
  2. Reverse the pledge installment marking — the installment goes back to "due" or the prior status

Ayuna handles step 1 cleanly; step 2 may require staff to confirm the pledge installment status afterward.

Tax implications​

When a refund happens after the donor has received a tax receipt for that gift:

  • The voided receipt is the record that the gift was reversed
  • If the donor has already filed their tax return claiming the deduction, they're responsible for filing an amendment
  • Annual statements at year-end reflect net giving (gifts minus refunds)

Audit trail​

Every refund is logged with:

  • Who initiated it
  • When
  • The reason
  • The Finix transfer ID for traceback

The audit trail is preserved permanently — refunds don't erase history.

When NOT to refund​

  • A correction to fund or campaign — use Edit Donation instead, no money moves
  • A typo in amount when no charge was actually processed — use Edit Donation
  • A donor wanting to change which homeowner project benefits — Edit Donation, change the project field

Use Refund only when money needs to come back.

Refund vs. dispute / chargeback​

A refund is something your team initiates — the donor asked, or you agreed it was the right move. A dispute (also called a chargeback) is initiated by the donor's bank: the cardholder told their bank they didn't authorize the charge, and the bank pulled the funds back. The two are tracked separately.

Disputes flow into Ayuna automatically through the Finix integration and appear under Payments → Disputes in the admin app. From there your team can:

  • View the dispute amount, reason code, and response deadline
  • Upload evidence (the original receipt, donor communications, fulfillment proof)
  • Submit the evidence packet back to Finix for the issuing bank to review
  • Trigger a manual sync if you suspect Finix has updated state that hasn't reached us yet

Don't issue a refund on a transaction that's already in dispute — let the dispute play out. If you refund first and lose the dispute, you can be charged twice. If a dispute turns up on a sponsorship payment or a pledge installment, the same evidence-and-respond flow applies; the underlying record is updated when the dispute resolves.