Payment Processing for Non-Profits
Blackbaud is a software and merchant account provider that specializes in solutions for nonprofit organizations. Its payment solutions allow merchants to process credit card and ACH payments. Founded in 1981, the company has grown from a simple computerized billing service into one of the largest all-in-one solutions available for charities. Blackbaud utilizes Chase Merchant Services, Wells Fargo, and First Data Canada for its backend processing.
Blackbaud Location and Ownership
Blackbaud is headquartered at 65 Fairchild Street Charleston, SC. The company’s payment processing service is called Blackbaud Merchant Services and will be the primary focus of this review. Michael Gianoni is listed as the president and CEO of Blackbaud.
Blackbaud Merchant Services Review Table of Contents
- Costs & Contract: Blackbaud offers a month-to-month merchant account contract with no early termination fee and a flat-rate for all transactions.
- Complaints & Service: Blackbaud has received more than 10 public complaints.
- BBB Rating: Blackbaud has an “A+” rating with the Better Business Bureau and has received 10 complaints and 3 reviews in the past 3 years.
- Sales & Marketing: Blackbaud does not appear to hire independent sales agents and has received very few complaints about its sales practices.
- Rates & Fees: How Merchants Got The Best Rates With Blackbaud
On March 3rd Blackbaud implented a $50 per month Payment Enablement Fee to take effect and be billed April 1st for April through December. This is an unexpected and disappointing hit to the budget.
We are equally upset about this. The additional charge $450 annual charge was imposed outside of our signed contract. A Blackbaud rep told us today: “Your account executive or sales person would likely have had no idea of this charge, this was only
recently introduced by the highest levels of Blackbaud, I do not think they would be able to help.” We do not use any merchant services with our subscription as we have a separate setup with PayPal which is adequate (and reasonable!) for a nonprofit our size. Whoever these people are at “the highest levels”, they just lost our business.
Blackbaud offers an integrated payment program, but we are currently working with a merchant that is using Blackbaud and their current program is a “bill back” payment program. Most of the time these bill back programs don’t not work out in favor of the merchant. Bill back programs are confusing and allow processors to “hide” fees and charges. I’d like to hear your feedback on bill back and why a processor would ever use this kind of program.
The merchant we are working with does about $3-4M a year in revenue, so they are a decent size merchant.
Thanks for your comments on this Phillip!
Phillip:
Thank you very much for your review of Blackbaud Merchant Services. As the Payment Business product marketing manager, I wanted to reach out and let you know that we don’t charge an early termination fee. Clients can come and go as they wish without penalty.
Please don’t hesitate to let me know if you have any questions or if there’s any other information that you need.
Best regards,
Kendra DeWitt
Product Marketing Manager, Payment Business
Blackbaud, Inc.
kendra.dewitt@blackbaud.com | blackbaud.com