Donations declined
For: Finance adminStaff
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When Stripe declines a charge, it returns a decline code indicating the reason. Ministrium shows that code next to the failed attempt in Donations → Movements.
Most common codes
| Stripe code | Meaning | What to do |
|---|---|---|
insufficient_funds | No funds | Donor retries with another card |
card_declined | Issuing bank declined | Donor calls their bank and retries |
expired_card | Expired card | Donor updates the card in the donor portal |
incorrect_cvc | Wrong CVC typed | Retry the charge with the correct CVC |
processing_error | Temporary Stripe error | Retry in 5 minutes |
fraudulent | Stripe flagged the transaction as fraud | Contact the donor; do not retry without verification |
Donor tries and the donation does not arrive
- Ask the donor for the Stripe receipt email (if any).
- Search Donations → Movements filtering by donor email.
- If a failed attempt appears, look at the decline code and use the table above.
- If nothing appears, the charge never reached Stripe: the donor likely closed the tab before confirming. Ask them to retry.
Recurring donations that start failing
If a previously charging subscription begins to decline:
- The most common is
expired_card: the donor renewed their card and did not update it. - Stripe automatically retries up to three times within a week.
- After the third failure, the subscription enters past_due state. Ministrium notifies the donor by email asking them to update the card from the donor portal.
- If 30 days pass without payment, the subscription is automatically canceled.
When to escalate to Stripe
When the code is persistent processing_error, repeated do_not_honor or mass cases (more than 10% declines in one hour), open a ticket in the Stripe dashboard → Support and share the Charge ID. Ministrium cannot reverse issuing-bank decisions.
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