Bank and ACH Donations

Accept Bank/ACH donations through Stripe, including microdeposit verification and what happens when a bank payment fails.

Bank and ACH donations

When your organization connects Stripe, donors can choose Bank/ACH on the donation form alongside cards. Funds still settle through your Stripe account.

This guide is for organization managers. Donors following a checkout link can also see How to make a one-time donation.

Turn on bank donations

Connect Stripe

Go to Connections → Stripe and complete Connect with Stripe. Bank account payments are available through that same connection — there is no separate ACH switch in MemberDrive.

Publish a campaign and share the form

Publish your campaign and share the hosted donation form or an embedded form. On checkout, donors in the United States will see Bank/ACH as a payment option once Stripe is connected.

Microdeposit verification

Some banks ask donors to verify the account before the first ACH debit.

What donors see:

They finish checkout and get a receipt that says Bank verification needed.
Stripe sends two small deposits (or a descriptor code) to their bank account — this can take a short time to appear.
They open the Verify your bank account link from the receipt or from the email MemberDrive sends, confirm the amounts or code, and Stripe collects the donation afterward.

You may also get a manager notification that a payment is awaiting verification. Until verification finishes, that payment stays in an awaiting-verification state rather than paid.

When a bank payment fails

If an ACH debit cannot be completed (for example insufficient funds, or the account can no longer be used), MemberDrive emails the donor with a clear message and a link to update their payment method.

For scheduled payments — recurring memberships and pledge installments — MemberDrive may automatically retry a failed bank debit on the schedule those payments already use. One-time donations are not retried automatically; the donor needs to give again or update their method and complete a new gift.

Encourage donors on recurring or pledge schedules to keep a working payment method on file via Update your payment information after they log in.