Guest Checkout makes it easier than ever for donors to complete a gift without needing to sign in. Surfacing Apple Pay and Google Pay earlier in the donation flow reduces friction for first-time and returning donors, helping you capture more generosity in the moment.
This feature supports both one-time and recurring donations, and works alongside your existing cash gift flow. Donors who prefer to give via bank account or credit/debit card can still do so. Guest Checkout simply adds a faster path for digital wallet users!
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✅ Enabling Guest Checkout | 👤 The Donor Experience | ❓ FAQs
🧩 Smart Donor Matching & Data Integrity | 📋 Tracking & Reporting
✅ Enabling Guest Checkout
Guest Checkout is opt-in and can be enabled in 2 ways directly from your Dashboard. (Your Account Manager can also enable it for you!)
Option 1: Dashboard Banner
- Log in to the Dashboard.
- At the top of the Home page, locate the New Feature Carousel.
- Find the "Faster giving, just in time for" slide.
- Click Try it out to open the Organization Settings modal.
- Go to the Customizations tab.
- ✅ Toggle on Enable Guest Checkout, and click Save.
Option 2: Organization Settings
- Log in to the Dashboard.
- Go to Settings and select Customizations.
- Under the Giving Experience section, find Enable Guest Checkout.
- ✅ Toggle on Enable Guest Checkout, and click Save.
👤 The Donor Experience
When Guest Checkout is enabled, the giving flow works just as it does today, with one addition: Apple Pay and Google Pay appear earlier. This introduces a faster, frictionless path for digital wallet users!
Here's how the Guest Checkout experience enhances the standard flow:
🔒 Retained Customizations
Donors are required to choose their amount, frequency (one-time or recurring), location/campaign, fund/subcampaign, and dedication. (Step 2)
📲 Upfront Digital Wallets
Instead of prompting the donor to log in via verification code, the Guest Checkout flow presents Apple Pay and Google Pay immediately after the giving details.
⏭️ Skipping the Sign-In
Clear messaging lets donors know they can finalize their gift via a digital wallet, without signing in or creating an account.
🏦 Proceeding with the Standard Flow
If a donor prefers to give via ACH or manually enter a credit/debit card, they can simply bypass the digital wallet buttons. By selecting "Or sign in to give via bank or card," they will receive a one-time verification code to log in. (Step 4)
🧩 Smart Donor Matching & Data Integrity
To ensure clean data and prevent duplicate Donor Profiles, Guest Checkout utilizes a tried-and-tested smart matching logic (successfully utilized by ExpressGive for over 6 months).
Key Principles
- 📧 Email First, Phone Second: Our system looks up donors by email, then by phone number.
- ✏️ No Overwriting: Existing contact information is never overwritten. We only fill in missing fields (for example, adding a phone number to a Donor Profile that doesn't have one).
- 🔍 Duplicate Prevention: Before adding a phone number to a Donor Profile, we verify that no other donor is already using it.
- 🛡️ Non-Fatal Errors: If updating a phone or email fails, we log the error and continue with the Donor Profile as-is, so it never interrupts a donation.
Address Collection Limitations
We capture the billing address from the donor's Apple Pay or Google Pay payment sheet. However, to keep your data clean, an address is only saved to a Donor Profile if:
- The donor is new to your organization, and
- All 4 fields are present: Street, City, State, and Zip Code. (Partial addresses are not saved.)
📋 Tracking & Reporting
Once enabled, donations processed through the Guest Checkout flow will be easily identifiable in your reporting.
- Navigate to your Contributions Table.
- Open your filters to find the new Source option.
- Choose Guest Checkout to view all contributions from this new frictionless flow.
❓ FAQs
Will This Create More Duplicate Donor Profiles?
No, it will not increase duplicates. Guest Checkout uses the same smart attachment logic, as signing in by email. It has been running reliably with our ExpressGive feature for months.
Will There Be Any Impact on Pledges?
This feature has no effect on pledges. It only renders digital wallets in a new place within the UI.
What If My Organization Requires Address Collection?
If your organization requires address collection, please note that some donors giving via digital wallet may not provide a complete address (street, city, state, and zip code), depending on what's saved in their wallet.
- Address enforcement has no downstream effects. It is purely informational in our system and won't block a gift from processing.
- 📈 The trade-off is significantly less friction for the donor, which historically leads to a higher volume of completed gifts.
How Will This Impact My Custom Giving Links?
Guest Checkout has no impact on your giving link configurations or mappings. It simply drops Apple Pay and Google Pay into the existing UI.
Will Guest Checkout Still Capture Metadata?
Yes, Guest Checkout will still capture the Giving Link, Tap, and all standard metadata fields, just like a logged-in donation would.
Will This Reduce ACH (Bank Account) Adoption?
- ⚡️ Because the Guest Checkout experience is faster and easier, donors may naturally gravitate toward Apple Pay and Google Pay. (ACH giving requires a few more steps than digital wallets.)
- ❤️ While credit card processing fees are slightly higher than ACH, the reduction in friction tends to unlock more generosity overall, making it a net positive for your organization.