How Donation Receipts Work in MonkeyPod

MonkeyPod automatically sends tax receipts to supporters who donate online through your MonkeyPod fundraising pages or embedded donation forms. For donations you record manually, you can send receipts manually as well. Here's how each scenario works, plus how to send year-end giving summaries.

Automatic Receipts for Online Donations

Every time a donor gives through a MonkeyPod fundraising page or donation form, a tax receipt is emailed to them automatically — you don't need to do anything. It goes out immediately when the donation is processed, and gets recorded in the receipt log right on the donation page.

Learn more about setting up fundraising pages and receipts.

Sending a Receipt for a Manually Recorded Donation

When you record a donation manually (a check, cash gift, or EFT, for example), MonkeyPod doesn't send a receipt automatically. To send one:

1. Open the donation transaction.
2. Click Preview receipt to see exactly what the donor will receive.
3. Click Send receipt to email it.

Once sent, MonkeyPod logs the receipt in the donation record so you always have a record of when it went out.

A note on the sender address: The receipt is sent from the email address of whichever MonkeyPod user is currently logged in when they click Send receipt. So if Jane is logged in, the email address on the receipt would be Jane's email address, i.e. jane@goodwork.org.

What Appears on a Receipt

Receipts show the full donation amount the donor gave — not the amount after processing fees are deducted. This is the correct figure for tax purposes, since the donor's contribution is the full amount regardless of what your payment processor charges on the back end.

When setting up your donation options, you can make them partially deductible (for example, the donor received a gala ticket in exchange for their gift). In this case, the receipt will include both the total amount given and the non-deductible portion, so the donor can calculate their deductible amount.

See How to Record a Donation for how to enter that information when recording the gift manually.

Customizing Your Receipts

There are two ways to customize what donors see on their receipt:

Logo and colors — Your organization's logo and receipt color scheme are managed in My MonkeyPod > Organization Settings. Changes there apply across all your receipts.

Custom thank-you message — You can add a personalized message that appears on the receipt before the tax deduction information. This is configured on each individual fundraising page or donation embed, so different campaigns or forms can have their own unique message. To update it, open the fundraising page or embed you want to customize and look for the receipt message field in its settings.

Tracking Receipt History

MonkeyPod displays the receipt status directly on each donation record, so you can tell at a glance whether a receipt has been sent.

• If a receipt has been sent: You'll see the status and the date sent, along with options to preview and resend the receipt.

• If no receipt has been sent yet: You'll see the status along with options to preview and to send the receipt.

Sending Year-End Giving Summaries

Using MonkeyPod's email functionality, you can quickly send your donors a year-end giving summary.

By using Merge Tags, you can populate your email with their giving totals for the calendar year, as well as provide link to their personal donor portal, where they can download receipts for their contributions.

Here's how to build that email:

1. Go to Email Outreach > View and Create Campaigns and create a new campaign.
2. Write your year-end thank-you message.
3. Use the ::calendarYearDeductible.2025::      merge tag to insert the donor's total contributions for the calendar year. Be sure to change the year to the appropriate year.
4. Insert the ::community_portal_url::       merge tag where you want the link to appear — for example, "Click here to view your giving history for tax purposes."
5. Each donor who receives the email will see a personalized link that takes them directly to their own giving summary.

See How to Use Merge Tags for a full list of available merge tags.

Sending End of Year Giving Letter

Many organizations like to send physical mail with a year-end giving summary. MonkeyPod can help with that with our dedicated Year-End Giving Summary report. Learn more about how to send year-end giving letters.

FAQ

A donor says they didn't receive their automatic receipt — what should I check?

First, confirm their email address is correct on their contact record. You can then check the Receipt Log on the donation record to confirm whether a receipt was sent. (If the donation was made prior to April 2026, the Receipt Log will direct you to check the donor's Interactions tab for a record of an emailed receipt.)  If you need to resend a receipt, you can do so from the donation transaction page (either using the options in the Receipt Log or the commands in the action menu at the top left of the transaction page).

Does MonkeyPod send receipts for in-kind donations?

In-kind donations are recorded manually, so you'd send the receipt using the Send receipt button on the donation record, same as any other manually entered gift.