Stripe Donation and Payment Integration
Take donations and payments without card data ever touching your site.
LGTCS integrates eligible Stripe payments using hosted checkout, so card details never reach your server. Included from Impact upward.
Fixed-price packages from $300. No retainer, no licence fees.
Short answer
Stripe is a payment provider for approved accounts and use cases. LGTCS integrates eligible payments using Stripe's hosted checkout, which means the card form is served by Stripe rather than built into your site and card numbers never touch your server. Fundraising organisations must confirm provider eligibility and any required regulatory permission before the donation flow is offered.
docs.stripe.com- Nothing sensitive is stored on your site
- No card dataNothing sensitive is stored on your site
- Single gifts and monthly giving both supported
- One-off or recurringSingle gifts and monthly giving both supported
- Registered to you, paid out to your bank
- Your accountRegistered to you, paid out to your bank
What Stripe actually is
Stripe handles the part of a website that most needs to be done correctly: taking money. When somebody donates or pays, they are handed to a checkout page that Stripe serves, they enter their card there, and your site is told the result. The card number never arrives at your server, is never written to your database, and never appears in your logs.
That single design decision is why we use hosted checkout rather than building a card form into the site. Handling raw card data pulls an organisation into the demanding end of PCI DSS compliance, with the audits and liability that come with it. Using Stripe's hosted page keeps you in the simplest self-assessment category instead. For a nonprofit or a small team, that difference is worth more than any design flexibility a custom form would buy.
The practical surface is wider than a donate button. Stripe supports one-off gifts, recurring monthly giving, wallets such as Apple Pay and Google Pay, refunds from a dashboard your team controls, automatic receipts, and fraud screening on every transaction. Payouts land in your own bank account on a schedule you set.
Hosted checkout versus a card form on your own site
Both take a payment. The difference is where the card number goes, and who carries the consequences if something goes wrong. This is the reason LGTCS builds every payment flow the first way.
| Aspect | Stripe hosted checkout | Card fields built into your site |
|---|---|---|
| Where the card number goes | Straight to Stripe, never to your server | Through your site and your hosting |
| PCI DSS burden on you | The simplest self-assessment tier | A far heavier tier, with evidence required |
| If your site is breached | No card data exists there to steal | Card data may be in scope |
| Apple Pay and Google Pay | Included, no extra build | Separate integration for each |
| Bank verification steps | Handled by Stripe automatically | You build and maintain the flow |
| Ongoing maintenance | Stripe updates the page | Yours to keep current forever |
The trade-off is that the payment page is Stripe's, not yours. It carries your logo and colours, but it is a separate page rather than a form embedded in your design. We think that is a small price for keeping card data out of your systems entirely, and every organisation we have built this for has agreed once the alternative was explained.
How LGTCS uses Stripe on client projects
Specific decisions we make on real builds, not a feature list copied from the documentation.
One-off donations with suggested amounts
Preset amounts alongside a free-entry field. Suggested tiers meaningfully lift the average gift, and we set them from your own giving history rather than guessing at round numbers.
Recurring monthly giving
Supporters can commit to a monthly amount, managed by Stripe Billing. Renewals, failed-card retries and cancellation are handled for you, and donors can manage their own subscription without emailing your team.
Payment Links where no build is needed
For a single appeal, an event ticket or a one-off invoice, Stripe Payment Links produce a working payment page with no code at all. Your team can create these without us, which matters when a campaign has to go out this afternoon.
Wallets on by default
Apple Pay and Google Pay appear automatically on devices that support them. A supporter completing a donation with a fingerprint instead of typing a sixteen-digit card number is a measurably higher completion rate.
Webhooks so your site knows what happened
Stripe notifies your site when a payment succeeds, fails or is refunded. That is what triggers the thank-you page, the receipt, the CRM record and the campaign total. Without webhooks a donation can succeed at Stripe while your site never hears about it.
The Stripe account belongs to your organisation
We set Stripe up in your name with your bank details and your business verification, and are added with restricted access. Payouts go directly to you. LGTCS never sits between a donor and your bank account.
Thinking about a Stripe build?
Send us the pages you need and your deadline. We will tell you which package covers it and what it costs, usually the same day.
How a Stripe project runs, step by step
The same sequence on every project, whether it is a single landing page or a full platform.
- 1
Create the Stripe account in your name
Registered to your organisation, verified with your documents, paid out to your bank. LGTCS is added as a team member with limited permissions, which you can revoke at any time.
- 2
Map out what you are collecting
One-off donations, recurring giving, event fees, membership or invoices. Each behaves differently at checkout, and deciding this up front avoids rebuilding the flow later.
- 3
Build the checkout flow
Donation amounts, currency, description and the branding on Stripe's page. We test with Stripe's test cards, including declines and authentication challenges, not only the happy path.
- 4
Wire up webhooks and receipts
Your site is connected to Stripe's event feed so a successful payment triggers the confirmation page, the receipt and any record you want kept. Signatures are verified so the endpoint cannot be spoofed.
- 5
Test end to end in live mode
A small real payment through the finished flow, refunded afterwards, confirming the money reaches your bank and every notification fires as intended.
- 6
Hand over the dashboard
Your team is shown how to issue refunds, read payouts, export for your accountant and create a Payment Link without needing us.
What you receive
Everything below is handed over at the end of the project. Nothing is held back as leverage to keep you on a retainer.
- Stripe account registered to your organisation and verified
- Hosted checkout branded with your logo and colours
- One-off donation flow with suggested amounts
- Recurring giving, where the project includes it
- Apple Pay and Google Pay enabled
- Webhook endpoint with signature verification
- Automatic email receipts to every payer
- Success, cancelled and failure pages on your own site
- Test-mode and live-mode verification before launch
- Dashboard walkthrough for refunds, payouts and exports
Projects we build with Stripe
The kinds of work this part of the stack is genuinely the right answer for.
Nonprofits taking online donations
One-off and monthly giving, receipts sent automatically, and a campaign total your team can read without asking anyone to run a report.
Organisations selling event places
Ticket or registration fees collected through the same checkout, with the attendee list built from the payments rather than kept separately by hand.
Membership bodies collecting annual fees
Recurring billing with automatic retries on expired cards, which recovers renewals that would otherwise quietly lapse.
Consultancies invoicing clients
A Payment Link on an invoice, so a client pays by card immediately rather than waiting for a bank transfer to clear.
The business reason we chose it
Technology decisions only matter if they change something you can measure.
Card data is never your problem
Nothing sensitive is stored on your site, so a breach of your website cannot expose a supporter's card.
Fewer abandoned donations
Wallet payments, a checkout that works properly on a phone, and no forced account creation all remove reasons to give up partway through.
Your finance team can work unaided
Refunds, payouts and exports happen in a dashboard your staff control. Nothing about taking money depends on your web developer being available.
In our packages
Included from the Impact package upward where Stripe approves the account and use case. Donation conversion tracking is added with Growth, and custom payment workflows with Digital Platform.
See all four packages side by sideStripe questions we get asked
The things clients actually ask before signing, answered plainly.
What are Stripe's fees, and does LGTCS take a cut?
LGTCS takes nothing. Stripe charges a percentage plus a small fixed amount per successful transaction, at its own published rates, and those rates vary by card type and country. The fee is deducted by Stripe before the money reaches your bank, and it is billed to your Stripe account rather than through us. Ask LGTCS during scoping and we will show you the current rates that apply to your country and expected mix of donors, in writing.
Do I need to worry about PCI compliance?
Far less than you would with a card form on your own site. Because LGTCS uses Stripe's hosted checkout, card numbers never reach your server, which places you in the simplest self-assessment category rather than the tier requiring evidence and audits. It is not nothing, and you will still confirm a short questionnaire, but it is the difference between a form and a project. We will tell you exactly which questionnaire applies to your setup.
Can supporters give monthly rather than once?
Yes. Recurring giving runs on Stripe Billing, which handles renewals, retries a failed card automatically and lets donors manage or cancel their own subscription without contacting your team. Monthly giving is usually the single biggest change a charity can make to predictable income, so if it is relevant to you, tell LGTCS at the scoping stage and we will build it into the first release rather than adding it later.
Where does the money go, and how quickly?
Straight into your own bank account, on a payout schedule you control in the Stripe dashboard. The account is registered to your organisation and verified with your documents. LGTCS never holds, routes or has access to your funds at any point.
Can donors cover the transaction fee?
Yes, and many will if you ask. We can add an optional tick box at checkout that adds the processing fee to the gift. In practice a meaningful share of donors accept it, which recovers most of the cost of taking the payment. Tell LGTCS if you want this and we will include it in the donation flow.
What happens if a payment fails or needs refunding?
Failed payments are reported back to your site through webhooks so the supporter sees a clear message rather than a blank page, and nothing is recorded as received. Refunds are issued by your own team from the Stripe dashboard in a few clicks, and the refund event flows back to your site so your records stay accurate.
Can LGTCS add Stripe to a website I already have?
Usually yes, and how involved it is depends on what the site is built on. Adding Stripe to an existing static or Next.js site is straightforward. Sites built on closed platforms sometimes restrict which payment providers are allowed, and that is worth checking before anything else. Send LGTCS your current web address and what you want to collect, and we will tell you whether it can be added, what it would cost, and whether rebuilding would work out cheaper than patching.
The rest of the stack
Every tool we use has to work with the others. These are the closest neighbours.
Guides on the decision behind this
Longer comparisons that weigh this up against the alternatives, including the ones we do not sell.
Ready to build on Stripe?
Tell us what the website needs to do. We will tell you which package covers it, what it costs, and when it goes live.