Payment processing

This page outlines the overall payment processing steps that Donate Now - Premium takes, as well as troubleshooting tips and best practices for when a donor receives an error during payment processing.

Note: This page applies only when the payment service is set to BluePay.

Terminology

AUTH — An initial credit card authorization.
- Can be for a specified amount, in which case, it will check if those funds are available. Funds are also reserved (a "hold") in anticipation of a CAPTURE (see below).
- Can be for $0.00, in which case, it will only check if the credit card information itself is valid.
- Returns an Authorization Code or Authorization ID.
CAPTURE — Takes a previous AUTH's Authorization Code and finalizes the transaction, initiating the transfer of funds.
- Cannot be performed without a prior AUTH.
- Must occur within (typically) 1-2 days, or the AUTH will expire.
- If the AUTH expires, no funds are transferred, and the hold is removed from the account.
VOID — Reverses an AUTH.
- You cannot VOID a CAPTURE if it has been settled. In this case, issue a refund instead.

Processing steps

Do the following to process payments:

Payment steps

As it pertains to BluePay payment processing, the following steps are performed:

A $0 AUTH is issued directly from the user's browser using the BluePay.js library.
- The result of this transaction is that the sensitive payment information is exchanged for a transaction ID that can be used for a subsequent payment.
- For CVV2 checking / verification to work, the client account must be on the BluePay North/8583 Platform or Nashville/DLHost platform, and Real $0 AUTHs must be enabled. Migrating to the North or Nashville DL Host Platforms does not incur a fee on the account.
An AUTH for the dollar amount of the donation is issued, using the previous transaction ID as the MasterID.
- If successful, the gift information is written to iMIS – see below.
A CAPTURE for the previous AUTH is issued.

Each of the above steps represents a separate transaction in BluePay. When reviewing transactions for reconciliation purposes, you should look in BluePay at either the CAPTURE transaction, or the AUTH (Captured) transaction. (Disregard the first $0 AUTH transaction.) See below for an example of a single Donate Now - Premium donation which incurs three separate transactions in BluePay.

Custom fields in BluePay

Donate Now - Premium writes the following custom fields onto the CAPTURE (or SALE) transaction in BluePay:

Custom ID 1: iMIS Invoice Reference #
Custom ID 2: Batch Number

Detailed steps

Donate Now - Premium performs the following steps when a donation is made:

The credit card information is sent via the donor's browser window directly to BluePay to validate and exchange it for a temporary Authorization ID. (Referred to as a $0 AUTH)
1. This process is 100% PCI compliant. No sensitive credit card / account information is sent to, or stored on the web server or iMIS server.
The resulting temporary auth code is sent to the Donate Now - Premium endpoint as a replacement/alternative for sensitive credit card/ACH details.
The donor is matched to a contact in iMIS, or a new donor contact record is created in iMIS.
An AUTH request is made to BluePay with the Authorization ID from Step 1, for the donation amount.
A new iMIS Fundraising Gift is built with the following settings:
1. Basic information like the amount and donor's iMIS ID are set.
2. The Cash Account is determined based on the Financial Account settings and type of donation.
3. The Distribution, Appeal, and Campaign codes are set based on the template settings.
4. The Merge Code is set based on if the donor added a Tribute to the donation form.
5. The Payment Type is set to "Cash" (because BluePay processes the credit card directly, iMIS gifts are entered as "Cash" gifts).
6. A current, open batch is looked up, or a new batch is created based on the current Financial Account settings.
7. The gift information is held in memory, and has not been written into the iMIS database yet.
8. The Gateway Ref # is set to the BluePay Transaction ID
9. UF_2 is set to the BluePay Transaction ID
10. If this is a new recurring donation, UF_3 is set to the BluePay Rebilling ID
The gift is saved into the database.
1. This process touches the following tables: Activity, Trans, Invoice, Batch, GiftReport.
The batch control cash and control count are updated, and the batch is saved.
(Recurring start payments only) The recurring plan information is written to the Demo_Recurring_Gift table.
A CAPTURE request is made to BluePay to finalize the transaction and initiate the transfer of funds.
A receipt is generated, e-mailed, and displayed on-screen.

Failure do's and don'ts

During a failed donation, or when manually modifying donations, be sure to follow these guidelines:

Don't: Delete just the gift activity from iMIS in the Customers module.

Note: If you need to delete a gift, always delete a gift using the Fundraising module. Check the table below before deleting the gift.

Don't: Use the BluePay Secure Console to manually issue a CAPTURE to an AUTH made by Donate Now - Premium.

Do: VOID a failed Donate Now - Premium payment that has an AUTH but no CAPTURE. This can sometimes speed up the removal of the temporary hold from the donor's account.

Don't: Use the BluePay Secure Console to manually process a donor's credit card based on a gift that already exists in iMIS.

Note: Reconciliation will be difficult or impossible as the Gateway Ref # and BluePay Transaction ID will be different.

Don't: Issue a refund in BluePay without also deleting the gift from iMIS, or vice versa.

Note: Reconciliation will not match if both steps are not performed.

Do: Encourage donors to attempt their donation again after a short period of time (5-15 minutes) if a failure occurs.

Do: Contact support if you have any discrepancies between BluePay payments and iMIS gifts / transactions – we can help!

Failures during processing

The Donate Now - Premium process is designed to minimize the amount of data discrepancy between BluePay and iMIS when a failure occurs. However, some unforeseen errors can occur during processing. See below for troubleshooting steps during each of these steps.

Problem Step	Actions Taken So Far	Actions Not Taken	Notes	Suggested Actions
Step 1 – Initial Payment Info Exchange (in browser)	None	No contact is created No gift data is written to iMIS No pending charges will appear No recurring plan is set up No funds are transferred No receipt was sent	If an error occurs in the browser, it is likely that the payment information is invalid (invalid account number, CVV2, etc).	The donor should verify and adjust their payment information.
Step 2 – Donor Lookup / Contact Creation	A contact record may have been created	No gift data is written to iMIS No pending charges will appear No recurring plan is set up No funds are transferred No receipt was sent	An error may occur here if one of the contact lookup queries failed due to a SQL server timeout or deadlock.	The donor should re-attempt their donation.
Step 3 – AUTH Request	A contact record may have been created A temporary hold is placed on the donor's account for the donation amount	No gift data is written to iMIS No recurring plan is set up No funds are transferred No receipt was sent	If an error occurs here, it is likely either an Insufficient Funds error, or a BluePay account settings issue.	The donor should verify they have enough funds. The Donate Now - Premium administrator should verify the Financial Account settings are set up correctly.
Step 4 – Building the Gift Object	A contact record may have been created A temporary hold is placed on the donor's account for the donation amount	No gift data is written to iMIS No recurring plan is set up No funds are transferred No receipt was sent	If an error occurs here, it is likely an iMIS or Donate Now - Premium settings / configuration error.	The Donate Now - Premium administrator should verify financial and system settings against settings in iMIS.
Step 5 – Saving the Gift	A contact record may have been created A temporary hold is placed on the donor's account for the donation amount Gift datamay have been written to iMIS	No recurring plan is set up No funds are transferred No receipt was sent	If an error occurs here, it is likely either a SQL timeout or SQL deadlock issue. Both issues are unavoidable and result from high demand or other scripts / jobs running simultaneously on the SQL server.	The donor should re-attempt their donation. The Donate Now - Premium administrator should verify the information in iMIS. If a gift was written, delete the gift from the Fundraising module in iMIS. Never delete just the gift activity. Always use the Fundraising module. If a partial gift was written (some database records but not all), attempt to delete the gift from iMIS, or manually clean up the records in the database. Contact support for assistance in this scenario.
Step 6 – Batch Control Updates	A contact record may have been created A temporary hold is placed on the donor's account for the donation amount Gift data is written to iMIS	No recurring plan is set up No funds are transferred No receipt was sent	If an error occurs here, it is likely either a SQL timeout or SQL deadlock issue. Both issues are unavoidable and result from high demand or other scripts / jobs running simultaneously on the SQL server.	The Donate Now - Premium administrator should review and reconcile transactions. If all transactions match up in the batch 1:1 with gifts entered into iMIS, and corresponding BluePay transactions, but the control counts on the batch are out of balance, update the control counts manually to match.
Step 7 — Recurring Plan Setup	A contact record may have been created A temporary hold is placed on the donor's account for the donation amount Gift data is written to iMIS A recurring plan mayhave been set up	No funds are transferred No receipt was sent	If an error occurs during this step, it is possible that the recurring plan record was not written to the Demo_Recurring_Gift table correctly.	The Donate Now - Premium administrator should verify that there are no demo table validation errors on the Database tab in Donate Now - Premium.
Step 8 – CAPTURE Request	A contact record may have been created A temporary hold is placed on the donor's account for the donation amount Gift data is written to iMIS A recurring plan is set up Funds may be transferred	No receipt was sent	If an error occurs here, funds may or may not be captured.	The Donate Now - Premium administrator should log in to the BluePay Secure Console and look up the AUTH and CAPTURE transactions for this donation. If there is an AUTH but no CAPTURE: Delete the gift from iMIS using the fundraising module. The donor should re-attempt their donation. If there is an AUTH and a CAPTURE: The donation is complete, and the donor just did not receive a receipt.
Step 9 – Receipts	A contact record may have been created A temporary hold is placed on the donor's account for the donation amount Gift data is written to iMIS A recurring plan is set up Funds are transferred An on-screen receipt and/or an e-mail receipt may have been sent		If an error occurs here, the donation was complete but the donor did not receive a receipt.	The Donate Now - Premium administrator should verify the e-mail / SMTP settings for accuracy. The Donate Now - Premium administrator should attempt a test e-mail. On the Template Edit screen, go to the Receipt tab, and click the "Preview" link under the e-mail receipt option. This screen allows you to send a test e-mail using your current SMTP settings.