"Deposit Discount Fee" — how is it calculated?

[smarkham]

Hello,

We are looking for more information on how the "Deposit Discount Fee" is calculated for C&P Transactions?


For a $100 payment, C&P says here that there are 3 fees that are charged:

		So, for a $100 payment...:
C&P charges a platform fee (3.75% of the payment)	$3.75	...
C&P charges a per-transaction fee ($0.37 for each transaction)	$0.37	if they opted to pay the fees: ($3.75 + $0.37 = $4.12) $100 + ($4.12) = $104.12 This is the "Total Charged" and the "Deposit Gross Amount"
C&P charges a daily deposit fee ($1.50 once per day: all transactions with same SweepID are batched and 1 deposit fee is deducted)	$1.50	(see below)

.

We are trying to figure out the difference between:

• the $4.12 fees (platform fee + per transaction fee) and
• the $3.90 "Deposit Discount Fee" — which appears in our Settlement reports and in our Salesforce reports.

We tried to search C&P's support articles for "Deposit Discount Fee" (and also searching these forums, then tried googling it) but couldn't find an explanation.


Our report shows the "Deposit Net Amount" for the $100 payment (with fees paid/deducted) would be $99.85.
That math works for $104.12 - ($3.90) - ($0.37) = $99.85.

• But why is there a difference between the platform fee ($3.75 charged to the donor) and the Deposit Discount Fee ($3.90 charged to us)?
• Where is the fee of $3.90 coming from?

The final deposit that hits our account is: $99.85 - ($1.50) = $98.35.
So the difference between the platform fee and the Deposit Discount Fee does not appear to be related to the daily deposit fee.


And just to show the math:

• the difference between $4.12 and $3.90 is $0.22
• the difference between $3.90 and $3.75 is $0.15

Our question is, what math is calculating the $3.90 Deposit Discount Fee?


Thanks in advance for any information you can provide!

[CnP.LiveSupport.AB]

Hi smarkham ,

When you use the "Additional Fee" feature - your reported numbers come back as being slightly larger than the 3.75% + 0.37 that you expect.

There is no way for us to add an amount to the donation that is 'excused' from the 3.75% fee. We are not actually the bank - we are the company that is providing the software for you to interact with the bank (merchant account), albeit that it is our "partner" bank. The best we can do is provide a feature that offers that option to your donors in some way.

So, when someone makes a $100 donation, and your additional fee option is set to match our fee structure: add 0.37 + 3.75%, the bank is assessing the fee on THAT total: $104.12.

You set what that fixed amount and/or percentage in CONNECT's Campaign Details: we aren't suggesting that the feature covers the fees, only that you can use it that way if you choose.
In some states it's illegal to charge a different amount to use a credit card than you do for other payment methods (cash, check)

So there is a "soft cost" to using the additional fee feature - it makes bookkeeping more difficult. You just have to weigh that against the benefit you get by offering that option to your patrons.

[CnP.LiveSupport.AB]

Regarding the 1.50 fee:

The 1.50 fee is assessed against the entire "batch" or "sweep" - so there's no way to calculate how much a single donation's portion of that $1.50 fee is without knowing all the other transactions that are included in that batch.

Let's say in a single day you have a donation of $100 and another of $50 (we're leaving out additional fee, since that's not really relevant to the deposit fee). Your total for the batch is $150. You could say 1.00 of the 1.50 fee is the portion of fees for the $100 transaction, and 0.50 is the portion of fees for the $50 transaction.

But if on a different day you have 3 donations: $100, $50, and another $50 - this affects the way you would ration that $1.50 fee between those donations. Now the $100 would account for 0.75 of the $1.50 fee, and the $50 donations would represent 0.375 of the $1.50 fee.

The $1.50 fee was designed to minimize the effect on our smaller clients - rather than a monthly charge that would be the same for everyone, smaller organizations would not have to pay for days where they had no donations at all. But we are aware of the settlement issue this has introduced, so it is likely that we will move away from the deposit fee structure in the future.

[smarkham]

So, when someone makes a $100 donation, and your additional fee option is set to match our fee structure: add 0.37 + 3.75%, the bank is assessing the fee on THAT total: $104.12.

Understood:
The $3.90 Deposit Discount Fee = ($104.12 Total Charged) x (3.75% platform fee)

Thank you!