I have a hard time believing that we are the only organization with this situtation, so here is my post...
We allow our constituents to donate to multiple designations using different NetCommunity v5.6 forms based on the fund (e.g. hunger has its own form, disaster has a different form) just because we have roughly 30 funds. If we use multiple forms, the donor gets a separate e-mail for each designated fund (e.g. if you split your gift to three funds, you get three emails and your gifts are enter in RE as three separate donations - which throws off donor analytics).
Blackbaud has been very helpful in our attempt for a solution. They suggested using one form and opening a new window for the donor that wants to read about the fund. If we use one form, it solves the multiple email and multiple gift problem (the email issue will be resolved in the next version of the software). However, you cannot navigate off of this form to read about the fund or you lose all of your gifts in your 'cart'. Our fund raising unit did not really like that.
So, after all that, does anyone use multiple forms for donations? If so, how do you handle the multiple email issue? Then, how do you handle the split gifts going into the Raiser's Edge constituent as separate amounts rather than one total amount?
Thanks!
Pat
p.s. We initially went with the eStore which could solve this, but it had issues and had to be customized which would be additional maintenance costs.
Patrick, perhaps you could use javascript to open the fund information in a new window and thus not loose the cart contents. Here is a quick example, a million different ways to do it but sample below would open CNN in a windo 400 by 200 situation 100 pixels from the top and left of the screen..
<FORM> <INPUT type="button" value="New Window!" onClick="window.open('http://cnn.com','cnn window','width=400,height=200,left=0,top=100,screenX=0,screenY=100')"> </FORM>
Hi, Tom,
Thanks much for your reply. Yes, we have tried to convince our staff of that option. For some reason, it wasn't seen as a viable solution...but I appreciate your response.