Let’s face it. You spend more and more of your life, time and resources online, including the time you’ve taken to read this blog post. One of the big trends in giving these days are online donations. Many churches and 501(c)(3) charitable organizations accept donations online. I even heard a pastor say that he could hardly remember how to write a check, while rolling out the latest “ATM” style donation machine to be placed at the back of the church. I’m not condemning, just noting!

But did you ever stop to think that there’s a cost to all of this? Most merchant service processors, which is the fancy term for the back-end processing unit of a credit card account, charge between 2-3% of your donation. Those fancy little processors that fit into a tablet or smartphone? Even those charge a flat fee of somewhere around 2.75% as of this writing. Who pays that? Why, the church or charitable organization, of course. Over the course of a year, and over a large volume of transactions, what appears to be a simple fee can add up to huge dollars that are being used, not for the Lord’s work, but for our convenience.

So, do that organization a favor. If you want or need to process a donation online, here are a couple of things you can do: (1) Add a little extra to cover the cost of the transaction, or (2) consider having your bank issue an online check using a Bill Pay transfer (many times there’s not a charge for this).

Or, go back to old school, get out the checkbook and refresh your memory on how to fill one out or you could just pay cash (but get a receipt if you want to deduct it!!).

Above all, remember that giving is an act of worship and a matter of the heart, regardless of the method of how you get it there.