Giving Assistant, Benevity and Other "nonprofit" donor partners--anyone with experience?

Our nonprofit just received a $110 check from Benevity and supposedly a promise of a few dollars from Giving Assistant. We don’t know and have no connection with either of these companies. I have read what I can online reviewing both companies.

People have mixed reviews of Giving Assistant, saying that it doesn’t give the full amount promised (its supposed to give a portion of purchases to the nonprofit instead of giving it to the buyer like ebates, amazonsmile, and similar). Nonprofits also complain about the huge lag from the time they are notified of the pending donation and the time it’s actually disbursed (supposed to be 6 months from date of purchase).

Can’t find much about Benevity at all (a Calgary company). It does say that after they cut you 3 checks, the next checks are 7% or minimum of $25 apiece, trying to encourage you to give your account info so they can do electronic transfer (which has its own issues). Glassdoor reviews from its employees are rather mixed–several of the employees who have been there 3 or more years talk about some chaos of it growing too fast, tight deadlines, people getting promoted above competence level, low supervision, etc. I can’t find much info from nonprofits who are actually registered with this company, but have read a few complaints about how much was deducted for having checks written by Benevity.

I’m uncomfortable with providing account information to Benevity for direct deposit, since I don’t know enough about them and we’re a tiny nonprofit. I’d appreciate anything that anyone knows about these companies and can share. Thanks!

I actually work in gift processing and data tracking. Benevity is a large for-profit that provides workplace giving services for a lot of companies. They are legit, but they do take a lot of fees, especially for checks. We actually haven’t given them direct deposit info because our account department is pretty antsy about doing that in situations where we don’t really have to, but we’ve been consistently getting checks from them for years.

Anyone else have any experience? My bookkeeper sees nothing wrong with registering and even giving them direct deposit info. I may wait until after my board meeting next month and make sure no one there has anything bad to say nor any reservations.

I believe Benevity does a lot of the administration for corporate philanthropy, matching gifts, and what used to be United Way type payroll deduction gifts.

I don’t know much about them but my organization has received donations thru them.

Thanks @surfcity and @eireann. I will complete the registration when I meet with my webmaster on Sunday so he can make my logo fit the criteria they require. My bookkeeper has no qualms about giving them info so they can direct deposit.

The nonprofit I work for receive occasional gifts from Benevity.

It does seem like Benevity processes A LOT of $$$$! They are growing very quickly and say they have 400 employees!