Suggestion: Choice of Making Round-Dollar Donations!

[wut?!]

One of the hosts I use is very geeky and chock-full of really nice features. Many done so well, you wonder how other hosts got them to be so clunky. One of the features they have fits in at DonationCoder really well, I think.   

You see, it's a little disappointing when you intend to donate a certain amount of money, but then you remember all-too-late that only a percentage of that money will go toward the endevours for which it had originally been purposed.

So, at my host, they implemented a way to select between "gross" or "net," giving you the option to essentially pay the transaction fees yourself, if you so choose:



You can even clearly see, before you pay, how much of the payment will be alotted to actual hosting and how much you'll be paying in transaction fees. That way you can decide whether to eat the fees yourself, or allow them to be gouged from the amount you've already specified.

I LOVE seeing a nice, round $50.00 after a payment/donation!    

Plus, that would ultimately lead to some larger donations, I would hope. At least, by a percentage.   

Much more than seeing that the $50.00 was already eaten down to the $46.somethingorother that I'm left with after the transction fees.         

[Curt]

sounds like a good idea, I think

maybe set up a poll about it?

[wraith808]

A lot of it is going to depend on the platform's ability to support such, I'd think.

[wut?!]

Thanks for the replies, guys! 

As long as they publish accurate and honest fee rates, the services don't have to do anything at all. 

With the customer's initial amount and the fee rates as published by the payment gateway, you have all the data you need to do the gross and net calculations.

Ask user for initial amount.
Do the two calculations.
Query the user on which total to use.
Send the payment or ping the payment gateway with the total amount as selected by the user.

The payment service doesn't need to be aware of the details of what's going on, nor provide any special API. This is just another cool function of their awesome website!

[wraith808]

When I say platform, I mean SMF, the forum software.  That screen and everything behind it had to be done with custom code.

[wut?!]

When I say platform, I mean SMF, the forum software.  That screen and everything behind it had to be done with custom code.

Right. That's the main reason I posted, actually. It seemed well-within the capabilities of the person who wrote those pages. 

[wraith808]

When I say platform, I mean SMF, the forum software.  That screen and everything behind it had to be done with custom code.

Right. That's the main reason I posted, actually. It seemed well-within the capabilities of the person who wrote those pages. 

If it's possible.  And we go again around the circle.