Every fee, deadline and rule below comes from Stripe's or PayPal's own pages, read in October 2026. Both change them, so check the linked page before you act. This is general information, not legal or tax advice.
What happens when a donor disputes a donation?
The donor's bank takes the money back and asks you to justify the charge. Stripe says that when a dispute opens it "debits the disputed amount, plus a dispute fee, from your Stripe account" and holds the funds until the end. The result is "at the sole discretion of the account owner's bank."
Some disputes start as an inquiry, mostly on American Express and Discover. Stripe warns an unanswered inquiry can become a "likely unwinnable" chargeback, so answer it the day you see it.
On PayPal, the donor opens a dispute in the Resolution Center, and PayPal says there is "usually a 20-day period" before it can be escalated to a claim that PayPal decides. A donor who paid with a card can go to their card issuer instead, and then the issuer decides.
charge.dispute events or PayPal's CUSTOMER.DISPUTE events, so a dispute does not appear in WordPress. You respond in the Stripe Dashboard under Disputes, or in PayPal's Resolution Center. Stripe emails dispute notices to your account address, so make sure someone reads that inbox.How long do you have, and what does a dispute cost?
| Stripe (cards) | PayPal | |
|---|---|---|
| Donor's window | Typically within 120 days of the payment | Card disputes follow the card issuer's rules |
| Your time to respond | Usually 7 to 21 days, by card network | Usually 20 days to settle a dispute before it can become a claim; 10 days to answer a claim |
| Decision | Usually 60 to 75 days after you submit; 2 to 3 months in all | A claim "usually takes about 30 days" |
| Fee when it opens (US) | $15, not returned | Up to $15 Standard Dispute Fee ($30 High Volume), waived in the cases below |
| Fee to fight (US) | $15 counter fee, returned if you win | None listed |
Fees as published in October 2026 for US accounts on Stripe's pricing page and PayPal's merchant fees page; verify current amounts with Stripe and PayPal. PayPal's user agreement waives its standard fee for disputes settled with the donor before a claim, unauthorized-transaction claims filed with PayPal, claims worth less than twice the fee, and disputes "decided in your favor."
Bank debit is different. Stripe's ACH page says personal-account holders can generally dispute for up to 60 calendar days, and those disputes "are final and can't be contested."
Which dispute reasons show up on donations?
Stripe sorts network reason codes into nine categories. Four matter most for gifts:
| Stripe category | Example Visa code | What the bank is saying | For a donation |
|---|---|---|---|
| Fraudulent | 10.4 Other Fraud - Card Absent Environment | The cardholder didn't make this payment | Accept if a stolen card was used; fight if you can show the donor gave |
| Unrecognized | None | The cardholder doesn't recognize the charge | Contact the donor first; often a forgotten gift or an unclear statement name |
| Product not received | 13.1 Merchandise/Services Not Received | Something promised wasn't delivered | Rare unless a thank-you item or event was promised |
| Subscription canceled | 13.2 Canceled Recurring | The donor says they had stopped a recurring gift | Fight with dates if it was still active; refund if they had canceled |
Stripe calls fraud "a difficult dispute type to win because in many cases the reason for the dispute is correct," and Unrecognized "effectively indistinguishable" from it.
Should you fight the dispute or accept it?
Decide on the facts first. If a stolen card made the gift, accept. Stripe says accepting "isn't considered an admission of wrongdoing and doesn't affect your dispute fee."
If the donor really gave, weigh the numbers. On Stripe the $15 fee is gone either way, and countering risks another $15. Stripe's Radar win-likelihood scores, for disputes answered with relevant evidence, run from 60% for the strongest cases down to 5%, and it adds that "even in the most favorable cases, it's very difficult to overturn a disputed payment." On a $20 gift a fight rarely pays; on a $500 gift from a known donor it often does.
For Visa fraud disputes, Stripe flags cases that qualify for Visa Compelling Evidence 3.0, based on "prior non-fraudulent history with the cardholder," and says eligibility "typically translates to a significantly higher likelihood" of winning. Stripe's CE 3.0 FAQ lists the conditions, including at least two earlier undisputed payments from the same card made 120 to 365 days before.
How do you find the gift in Donor Merchant?
- Copy the payment ID from the dispute. Donor Merchant stores Stripe gifts under the PaymentIntent ID (it starts with
pi_) and PayPal gifts under PayPal's capture ID, or the sale ID for recurring payments. - Search for it. Open Donor Merchant > Donations and paste the ID into Search donations. It also matches donor name and email.
- Screenshot the row: donor, amount, frequency, method, status, transaction ID and date.
- Pull the donor's history. Earlier undisputed gifts help show this person gives to you. Export CSV downloads every donation; filter it to this donor and save those rows as a PDF.
- Find the receipt. There is no "view receipt" button on the Donations screen; the printable receipt link goes to the donor in their receipt email and the donor portal. For one-time Stripe gifts, Donor Merchant gives Stripe the donor's email as the receipt address, so in live mode Stripe sends its own receipt and fills the dispute form's Receipt field with it. For future disputes, add the
{receipt_link}placeholder to the New donation email under Settings > Email.
Donor Merchant does not save the donor's IP address, device or card check results. Stripe holds those.
What evidence should you send for a donation?
You get one submission. Stripe's response guide says "You can't edit the response or submit additional files," so gather everything first. Stripe says it "always includes any AVS or CVC results along with the purchase IP address (if available from your Stripe integration)." Donor Merchant passes the donor's name and email to Stripe when the payment is confirmed.
Fraudulent or unrecognized
- The donation row and the donor's earlier, undisputed gifts.
- Any emails with the donor, trimmed to the relevant lines. Stripe notes these "don't verify identity," so treat them as support, not proof.
- For a recurring gift, its start date and undisputed payments.
Subscription canceled
- What the form told the donor: a screenshot with the frequency and amount selected, and your cancellation wording. Donor Merchant does not print a cancellation policy on the form, so add one sentence to the page above it now.
- The subscription's dates from Stripe or PayPal: created, each renewal, and cancellation if any.
- Renewal notices: Donor Merchant's Recurring gift receipt, if switched on.
Product not received
Say plainly the payment was a donation with nothing to deliver, and attach the receipt. If you promised a thank-you item or event seat, attach proof it was sent or held.
Format
Stripe accepts PDF, JPEG or PNG, 4.5 MB combined, under 50 pages (19 for Mastercard), and banks "won't review any external content," so no links. Open with a short statement, for example: "[Donor name] gave $[amount] to [organization] on [date] through our website donation form. Their [number] earlier monthly gifts were not disputed. A receipt was emailed the same day (attached)."
How do you answer a PayPal dispute?
Message the donor in the Resolution Center first. PayPal does not charge its dispute fee on disputes "resolved directly between you and the buyer and not escalated to a claim." If it becomes a claim, PayPal says merchants "have 10 days to respond" and "failing to respond results in the claim closing in the customer's favor."
Know one limit: PayPal's Seller Protection terms list "Donations, including payments received as crowdfunding or crowdlending" as ineligible, so PayPal will not reimburse a lost donation claim. Its Purchase Protection terms exclude donations too, but a donor who paid by card can still go to their card issuer.
Donor Merchant marks a gift Refunded when PayPal sends a reversal event for it, and treats any reversal as the whole gift. PayPal's event list describes the trigger only as "PayPal reverses a payment capture," so check the gift's status yourself after any PayPal dispute closes.
What should you update when the dispute closes?
- Lost on Stripe: the gift still says Completed, because a dispute is not a refund event the plugin hears about. Find it in Donations and use Mark refunded. Status corrections never email the donor. The gift leaves your totals, thermometer and the donor's annual statement, and its receipt is relabeled as refunded, so save copies first.
- Fraud on a recurring gift: cancel the subscription in Stripe or PayPal.
- Gift Aid already claimed (UK): the Gift Aid screen lists claimed gifts later refunded, with the amount to report to HMRC.
How do card-testing attacks lead to disputes?
Bots test stolen cards with small "donations," and some succeed. Stripe's card-testing guide says "Customers notice successful payments and report them as fraud," which leads to early fraud warnings or fraud disputes. Its checklist for an active attack includes refunding fraudulent payments "to avoid disputes."
Stripe also says that, unrefunded, "about 40% of Visa and Mastercard EFWs become fraud disputes," and that refunding makes most sense for charges at or below your dispute fee, which describes most test charges. A refund does not erase the fraud warning, which Visa also counts, so stopping the attack matters more. Our guide to stopping a card-testing attack covers the first hour and the defenses.
How many disputes are too many?
Stripe's dispute measurement page says "All disputes, whether they're won or lost, count towards your dispute rate," and that the industry treats dispute activity above 0.75% as excessive.
Stripe's summary of the card network monitoring programs lists, for Visa's VAMP program, a "non-compliant" level of 5 disputes and fraud reports and a 0.5% ratio in a month, and an "excessive" level of 1,500 and 1.5% in the US. The count includes early fraud warnings, not only disputes. For Mastercard's Excessive Chargeback Merchant level it lists 100 chargebacks and a 1.5% rate. Fines are possible. During a card-testing attack, a small organization with few real gifts in a month can pass Visa's non-compliant level quickly, and Stripe says Visa may charge fees above it.
How do you prevent the next dispute?
- Use a statement name donors recognize. Stripe says "clear and accurate statement descriptors can reduce chargebacks and disputes." Set it in your Stripe Dashboard business details.
- Keep receipts on. Donor Merchant can email a receipt for every gift and a Recurring gift receipt for each renewal; check both are switched on in the email settings.
- Say what recurring means. State the amount, how often it is charged, and how to cancel, next to the form.
- Make canceling easy. Stripe recurring donors can cancel in the Donor Merchant donor portal. PayPal donors can't cancel there; the portal asks them to reply to a receipt email, and PayPal lets them cancel from their PayPal account settings. Stripe also suggests a reminder 7 days before a yearly renewal, which Donor Merchant does not send.
- Refund when a donor asks. Stripe says monitoring programs "don't consider refunds when identifying disputes."
Sources
- Stripe: How disputes work (read October 2026)
- Stripe: Respond to disputes (read October 2026)
- Stripe: Dispute reason code categories (read October 2026)
- Stripe: Dispute evidence best practices (read October 2026)
- Stripe: Pricing (US) (read October 2026)
- Stripe: ACH Direct Debit (read October 2026)
- Stripe: Measuring disputes (read October 2026)
- Stripe: Dispute and fraud card monitoring programs (read October 2026)
- Stripe: Protect yourself from card testing (read October 2026)
- Stripe: Statement descriptors (read October 2026)
- Stripe API: Create a PaymentIntent (receipt_email) (read October 2026)
- PayPal: Merchant fees (last updated October 1, 2026; read October 2026)
- PayPal: User Agreement (read October 2026)
- PayPal: Disputes, claims, chargebacks and bank reversals (read October 2026)
- PayPal: Seller Protection program (last updated January 26, 2026; read October 2026)
- PayPal: Purchase Protection program (last updated January 26, 2026; read October 2026)
- PayPal Developer: Webhook event names (read October 2026)