Pledge Specification - Phase 1 - CRM

CiviCRM Implementation

Pledge Cases

Phase 1

admin enters recurring pledge of a given amount + payment of 1st installment
admin enters recurring pledge of a given amount + payment to be sent (i.e. pay later)
admin enters one-time pledge

Probably phase 2...

online constituent enters recurring pledge of a given amount online + pays 1st installment via credit/debit card
online constituent enters recurring pledge of a given amount with payment to be sent by check (i.e. pay later)
online constituent enters one-time pledge with payment to be sent by check (same as pay later contribution)
online constituent receives reminder to pay next "installment" of their pledge via email (email contains link to online contribution page where they can make the payment via credit/debit card)
logged in online constituent sees scheduled pledge payments on their "Contact Dashboard" and clicks "make payment" link to make payment via credit/debit card

Data Objects

Pledge

Contact ID
Contribution Type ID
Date Created
Date Modified
Date Cancelled
Frequency Unit (day, week, month etc.)
Frequency Interval (integer - e.g. every "3" months)
Frequency Day - The day of week, month or year that payment is scheduled.
Number of Installments
Total Pledge Amount
Pledge Status
Pledge Acknowledge Date (when acknowledgement of pledge was sent to constituent)
Honor Contact ID
Note (join to civicrm_note)
Initial Reminder Days (send first reminder this many days prior to each payment due date, default = 5)
Maximum Reminders (maximum number to send for a given payment, default = 1)
Additional Reminder Days (send additional reminder this many days after last one sent, up to maximum number of reminders)
Custom fields

These properties will be derived from the pledge's payment schedule

First Scheduled Payment Date
Next Scheduled Payment Amount
Next Scheduled Payment Date
Current Past Due Amt
Total Paid
Balance Due on Pledge

Pledge Payment

Scheduled and fulfilled pledges are recorded here. Fulfilled pledges are linked via contribution_id to the contribution record (which contains the payment details such as payment date, transaction id, etc.)

Pledge ID - Foreign key to pledge record.
Contribution ID - Foreign key to contribution record when payment is received.
Scheduled Date
Scheduled Amount
Last Reminder Date - Date when most recent reminder was sent
Number of Reminders - How many were sent. The reminder timing (relative to payment due date) and frequency will be configured in the Pledge.
Pledge Payment Status (pending, completed, overdue ... )

Pledge Listings and Forms

Details at CRM-3244.

Update Pledge Statuses and Generate Reminders

Details at CRM-3270.

Record Pledge Payments (admin / back-office)

Details at CRM-3269.

Search / Reporting

CiviPledge will have it's own Dashboard with a Pledge Summary showing Pledges Made, Payments Received, Balance Due and Overdue totals (details at CRM-3274). A new search component will allow users to search for pledges by status (e.g. Overdue, Completed...), pledge amounts, start dates, etc. We will include at least one custom search in the release as well - targeted at locating pledges by next payment due date, status, etc.

Issues

Fixed Total Pledge Amount vs. Open-ended Pledges
Some systems seem to require that a pledge have a "committed total amount" (sometimes referred to as the "pledge value"), while on our wiki requirements page folks mentioned the possibility of an "open-ended" pledge. Elin's comments on the older Pledges and Soft Credits page indicate that a having a "total pledge amount" is a defining characteristic of a pledge and needed for accounting purposes. The reporting that I've seen includes summing of these pledge totals - along with "balance due" amounts. Not sure how you do that when some pledges are open-ended? Maybe you just derive a "committed total" for a given accounting year.

For phase 1, all pledges will have a "committed total". We'll evaluate whether / how to support open-ended pledges in a subsequent phase.

Is a Recurring Contribution just one type / case of Pledge?
Our existing "recurring contribution" model seems to be exactly the same as one of the pledge cases listed below (online constituent enters recurring pledge of a given amount online + pays 1st installment via credit/debit card). In the current implementation the user can choose to set a fixed number of installments OR make the payments open-ended. Are recurring contributions really different from pledges, or are they just one of the pledge cases.

For phase 1, recurring contributions and pledges will be stored separately. Recurring contributions are auto-billed through a payment processor, can be open ended (number of installments is not defined).

Pledges and Contribution Pages / Campaigns / Funds ...
Are pledges linked to an Online Contribution page? What about offline pledges? Many systems allow linkage to a "campaign", "fund", "program" and/or "appeal".

Linkage to an Online Contribution page will be included in the data model in phase 1 but probably not implemented in the UI. Fund or program can be represented using the include contribution type. Campaigns are scheduled for a future release.

Billing for Recurring Pledges
How do we handle "billing" for scheduled pledges? Seems like we need a cron-job driven email notification. What about snail mail "billing". Is there a difference between a "bill" and a "reminder"?

We will build a cron-fired script to generate reminder emails for "due" pledges. Since a pledge is not a legal commitment or purchase - we'll call these pings "reminders" not "bills" - but the organization can modify template language as desired. Reminder letter generation (for postal mailing) will probably be addressed in phase 2.

Constructing the Pledge Elements
Pledges and their "payment schedules" may be "constructed" in a few different ways. We'll probably need a dynamic set of fields to to handle the relationships between the pledge elements:

Enter amount paid each time + frequency + number of installments (e.g. I pledge to pay $20 every month for 12 installments). Then the "pledge value/total amount" is calculated (e.g. $240).
Enter amount paid each time + frequency + end date (e.g. I pledge to pay $20 every month starting now until Dec 2008). Then the "pledge value/total amount" is calculated (e.g. $120).
Entering a total amount pledged + amount paid each time + frequency (e.g. I pledge to give $240 in monthly installments of $20). In this case the number of installments is derived (e.g. 12 installments)

Donor DB Application - Overview of Pledge Functionality

3 related record types:

Gift (regular contribution)
Pledge
Pledge Payment

Screens

Pledges and Pledge Payment Details

(This form is used for both types of records)

Date (created)
Amount
Value
Reason / Appeal
Campaign
Fund / Program
Anonymous?
Ack. ?
By Letter - select letter from drop-down
Comment
Memorial
Method (not sure what this is)
Chk Date and Chk #

Additional Pledge Details

Input fields:

Frequency (select Annual, Semi-Annual, Quarterly, Monthly, Bi-weekly, Weekly)
No. of Payments (text input)
First Payment Date

Displayed values (after pledge is created):

Next Scheduled Payment Amt
Next Pay Date
Total Paid
Balance Due
Current Past Due Amt
Schedule (table of calculated payment dates and amounts based on above values)
Payment History (table of actual payment dates + amounts for this pledge)

Record Pledge Payment

From Gifts and Pledges - pick contact
Pick Gift Type - Gift, Dues, Pledge, Pledge Payment, Sale
If pick Pledge Payment - then table of pledges for that contact - "Select a pledge"
Get pledge payment entry screen

OR ...

From the Pledge screen, click "Add Pledge Payment"

Reports

Pledge Report

For each pledge...

Contact: name, address, email, phone
Pledge: amount, date made, "To be paid in $number $interval payments, beginning on $firstPaymentDate"
Payments received:
dd/mm/yyyy $amount
Total Paid:
Balance Due:

Report Totals

Total number of donors
Total Pledges: $totalAmount
--------------------------------------------
Total Pledge Payments: $totalPaid
Total Balance Due: $totalAmount - $totalPaid

Pledges Past Due Report

For each past due pledge...

Contact: name, phone, email
Pledge Date (created)
Pledge Amount / Total Paid / Balance Due
Bill Amount / Past Due Amount (? not sure what the difference is ? )
Last Paid Date / Last Billed Date
(seems to be missing Past Due Date ?? )

Report Totals

Total Amount and Number of Past Due Pledges

Letters

Pledge Reminder

Could either create Word Doc template(s) w/ tokens
Gifts and Pledges dashboard has link to "Send pledge reminders" OR go to Quick Mailings and select "Quick Pledge Reminders"
App "finds" all "past due" pledges and creates Word doc w/ merged data (a letter for each past due pledge)

Contributions Statement

Create Word Doc template(s) w/ tokens
Gifts and Pledges dashboard has link to "Send Statements" OR go to Quick Mailings and select "Quick Contributions Statements"
A range of dates is requested.
Pledges, Pledge Payments, Pledge Balance and Contributions are reported within the date range, organized by fund or contribution type. An example is attached to this page.