We’ve talked before about some of the most popular online payment processors
suited to smaller non-profits who want to accept donations or sell
fundraising products on their websites. Now there’s another payment
option you might want to look at: Amazon Payments.
Amazon Payments makes it easy for millions of Amazon
customers to donate using the information in their Amazon.com accounts.
It offers a range of solutions that enable you to raise money via
one-time donations, recurring donations or selling goods for
fundraising.
You must be located in the United States to accept payments with Amazon Payments and Amazon Simple Pay Donations, specifically,
are only available to US-based, IRS-certified 501(c)(3) non-profit
organizations — but if your organization is eligible for the service, here are two good reasons to think about trying it out:
1. Free Amazon Payments Webinar
NTEN (NonProfit Technology Network) is hosting a free webinar
on June 24, presented by the Amazon Payments folks. It's a chance to go right to the source for answers to any
questions you have about the service, and for pointers to help you get started using it.
2. Free Trial Offer
Amazon is offering free payment processing until September 30 for non-profit organizations that start using Amazon Simple Pay Donations (HTML-based buttons for one-time donations) and Checkout by Amazon (simple tools for order management, shipping charges, sales tax, refunds, and cancellations) to accept payments online.
After the trial offer expires, you’ll pay on a per-transaction with no setup fees or on-going monthly charges. Amazon Payments' processing fees and volume discounts are essentially the same as the Paypal and Google Checkout
fees — as long as each donation is $10 or more. You can collect
donations as small as one dollar with Amazon Payments, but the processing
fee for amounts under $10 is a hefty 5.0% + $0.05 for all transactions,
regardless of the monthly volume.
Some of the large and small non-profit organizations who accept donations through Amazon Payments include the American Red Cross, Detroit Area Diaper Bank, One Day’s Wages, Louisiana Tech’s Sigma Nu fraternity, and One Laptop per Child — mostly as a second or third payment method, so donors have plenty of choice.
If
your organization is already using Amazon Payments, or if you’ve got
advice for other non-profits about choosing a payment processor to
handle online fundraising, please leave a comment and share your
experience?