Charitable Documentation

Learn how to make the most of Charitable with clear, step-by-step instructions.

Charitable & User Privacy

Charitable stores personal data about donors and registered users in your website’s database, as well as providing personal data to third party providers such as payment gateways (PayPal, Stripe, Authorize.Net, etc.) or newsletter providers (MailChimp, Campaign Monitor, MailerLite, etc.).

All or some of the following data may be collected and stored about a donor when they make a donation:

  • First & last name
  • Email address
  • Street address (street number & name, city, post code/zip code, state/province, country)
  • Phone number
  • Credit/debit card tokens

All or some of the above data may be shared with the payment gateway used to process the donation. If using Newsletter Connect, the donor’s personal data may also be shared with your chosen newsletter provider.

For credit card donations processed by Stripe or Authorize.Net, the following data is provided to the chosen payment gateway. NOTE: These details are not stored in your database:

  • Credit/debit card number
  • Expiry date
  • CVS

In addition, the following data may be collected for registered users when they create a fundraising campaign (requires Ambassadors or when they fill out their personal profile:

  • First & last name
  • Email address
  • Street address (street number & name, city, post code/zip code, state/province, country)
  • Phone number
  • Organisation
  • Bio / personal description
  • Website URL
  • Facebook profile URL
  • Twitter profile URL

Exporting Personal Data

As of WordPress 4.9.6, WordPress includes a personal data export tool which can be used to provide users with a downloadable file that shows all personal data your website contains about them. This data export will include the personal data mentioned above.

The personal data export tool can be reached via Tools > Export Personal Data.

Erasing Personal Data

As of WordPress 4.9.6, WordPress includes a personal data removal tool which can be used to erase the personal data stored by your website about a particular user. Your users may request to have their data removed; as of May 2018, this is a right of European residents and you are obliged to comply.

The personal data removal tool can be reached via Tools > Erase Personal Data.

You may be required to keep personal data relating to donations for a certain amount of time for legal or tax purposes. To support this requirement, you can configure Charitable to prevent personal donation data from being erased for donations within a certain time limit (i.e. the last three years). You can also mark which pieces of data must be retained for donations made within this time.

These settings can be configured via Charitable > Settings > Advanced.

Privacy Policy

As of WordPress 4.9.6, WordPress includes a tool that can help build your website Privacy Policy page. This will include suggested privacy policy text added by the plugins on your website, including Charitable.

You can access this tool via Tools > Privacy. You are strongly advised to carefully review the suggested privacy policy text added by your plugins and tailor it to your website needs.

Still have questions? We’re here to help!

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Improvement New Security

📣 New Security Features

We’ve introduced a suite of new security tools to give you total control over who accesses your forms, plus a new way to tidy up your database.

Advanced Security Suite

Layered protection: Cloudflare, ReCAPTCHA, IP Controls, and Rate Limiting.

We have overhauled our security settings to stop bots without blocking real donors.

  • 🤖 Flexible Protection: Choose between Google reCAPTCHA v3 or the privacy-first Cloudflare Turnstile to block bots invisible.

  • 🚦 Rate limiting: Stop spam floods by limiting how many submissions an IP address can make in a set timeframe.

  • 🛑 Total control: Use the new IP Blacklist to block bad actors instantly, or the IP Whitelist to let your team bypass checks during testing.

The Clean Donation Tool

Go from “Testing” to “Live” in seconds.

Finished setting up your site and need to get rid of all those test transactions?

  • 🧹 Sweep it clean: Bulk delete test donations and donor records with a single click.

  • 📉 Accurate reporting: Ensure your revenue stats are 100% accurate for launch day.

  • ⚙️ Reset sequences: Automatically resets sequential invoice numbering.

donation form New

🏗️ Visual Donation Form Builder

Building the perfect donation form just got easier. We have completely reimagined how you create forms with a new drag-and-drop interface.

Design Visually, in Real-Time

No coding, no guessing. Just point, click, and build.

Say goodbye to confusing settings pages. You can now edit your form and see exactly what your donors will see, instantly.

  • 🖱️ Drag & Drop: Easily add fields like names, addresses, or file uploads by dragging them exactly where you want them.

  • 🎨 Customize everything: Click any field to tweak labels, placeholders, and requirement settings on the fly.

  • 👁️ Live preview: See your changes immediately as you make them—ensure your form flows perfectly before you hit publish.

Flexible & Powerful

Works with all your existing campaigns.

  • 🧩 Deep customization: Add custom HTML, shortcodes, or CSS classes for advanced branding.

  • ⚙️ Smart fields: Collect exactly what you need with support for dropdowns, checkboxes, dates, and hidden fields.

Leaderboards New

🏆 Donor Leaderboards!

Turn your fundraising into a community event. Recognize your most generous supporters and inspire friendly competition with our new leaderboard tools.

Gamify Your Fundraising

Celebrate your top donors and encourage others to climb the ranks.

Create a public “Hall of Fame” to give your donors the recognition they deserve.

  • 🎨 Two stunning layouts: Choose the List View for a clean, data-rich table or the Card View for a modern, visual grid with avatars.

  • 🥇 Automatic highlights: The top 3 supporters get special Trophy and Crown icons to make them stand out.

  • 🧩 Place it anywhere: Add it to any page using the new Gutenberg Block, or drop it directly into your campaign using the Visual Builder.

Total Customization

You decide what to show and what to hide.

  • ⚙️ Flexible data: Choose to display or hide donation amounts, donor counts, or avatars.

  • 🔄 Lifetime stats: Works seamlessly with Recurring Donations to show a donor’s all-time total impact.

Improvement New templates

🎨 New Templates & List Builder

Launch faster and design better. We’ve added three professional campaign templates and a versatile new content block to help you tell your story.

3 New Campaign Templates

Ready-to-use designs for specific fundraising needs.

Don’t start from scratch. Pick a template tailored to your cause and launch in minutes.

  • 🎄 Holiday Fundraiser: A warm, festive design perfect for year-end giving, toy drives, or food pantries.

  • 🎓 School Fundraiser: Built for PTAs and sports teams. clearly highlights goals like playground upgrades or classroom tech.

  • Church Fundraiser: A trustworthy layout designed for building funds, mission trips, and tithes.

The New “List” Block

Organize your campaign details without writing code.

Make your campaign pages easier to scan and more visually engaging with our new builder block.

  • 📝 Flexible layouts: Choose from 3 distinct styles to display sponsorship levels, donation perks, or project goals.

  • 🎨 Rich customization: Add colorful headlines, support for emojis, and unlimited list items.

  • 👣 Smart footers: Include a built-in footer for extra context or a final Call to Action.