Help centre

• Group discount codes — a percentage off the platform fee for a school, club or group (50% off means 2.5% + GST instead of 5%).
• Coupons — usually a fee-free amount (for example the first $500 raised), a reduced rate after that, or both — sometimes with an end date.

A coupon's fee-free amount is a credit on your account, so it doesn't expire — it's yours until it's used up. Your dashboard shows how much fee-free fundraising is left and when a reduced rate ends. Anything outside the benefit is charged at the standard 5% + GST, and Stripe's card processing always applies.

One code per account. And if a sign-up offer is running (the launch offer, for example), new accounts get it automatically — you don't need a code for that. The sign-up page always shows the current offer.

The short version: be specific about what the money buys, add a real photo, make your own first donation, send the link directly to ten people you know, and post an update every few days.

• Almost there: the bar shows how much is left to go, which encourages supporters to help you cross the line.
• Goal reached 🎉: the bar celebrates, your supporters are emailed, and an update is posted to your campaign automatically.
• Extend the goal: once you reach it, you can raise your target from your dashboard — this resets the "almost there" urgency and lets the celebration fire again at the new goal.

• Use it on posters, flyers, receipts, newsletters or anything printed.
• Click Download QR (PNG) to save a high-resolution copy.
• The code always points to your live /f/… page, so it keeps working even if you redesign your campaign.

• Your selections show as badges on your public page so supporters and businesses can see your cause at a glance.
• Our AI checks your story against your selections in the background. If a tag isn't supported by your story it's removed (and the campaign is reviewed), and tags your story clearly describes are added.
• Some businesses choose not to fundraise for certain causes. If you're raising for one of those, their catalogue items show as not available for your fundraiser.

Prefer a helping hand? Type a few sentences in the story box (who you are, what happened, what the money is for), then tap ✨ Generate with AI to expand your notes into a full draft — the button unlocks once you've written enough detail, and you can edit the draft before publishing.

Editing a live campaign puts it back through a check. If you change what the page says — the story, title, photos, category, reasons, thank-you message, charity claim or raffle details — it's reviewed again before going public, usually within a minute, and you'll see a note on the form telling you so. Changing the goal, the end date or your campaign settings applies immediately.

• Holiday mode (Account → Holiday mode) pauses a campaign for a set period and reopens it automatically — the right choice if you're just away for a while.
• Archiving ends it: the page comes off the public site and stays off, and anyone with the link sees that it has closed.

Either way, orders, donations and payout records are retained for reporting and GST purposes. Want the whole account removed? See Closing (deleting) your account — that's only possible once recent sales and any money still in flight have cleared.

• Each supporter page has its own shareable link (/p2p/…) they can send to their own friends and whānau.
• Donations on a supporter page count towards both that page's goal and your main campaign total, and show in your campaign stats.
• Teams are set up by the organiser (name and an emoji); supporters pick one when they create their page, and your campaign page shows a team leaderboard.
• Everyone who raises for you gets their own thank-you and receipt emails, and you can see all the supporter pages created from your campaign page.
• Supporter pages take donations. Products, tickets and raffles stay on your main campaign page.

• At checkout you enter the delivery address, including the 4-digit postcode. We work out the correct zone from the postcode and add the right delivery charge to your order.
• The AI double-checks the address against the postcode and the supplier's coverage. If something looks off, the order is checked by a human before it's fulfilled.
• If the supplier doesn't deliver to your area, the order can't be placed and you'll see why.

• A person always reviews raffles. The AI never approves one, no matter how straightforward it looks — a moderator verifies the licence before ticket sales can start.
• Sales pause automatically if the licence expires, and ticket purchases are blocked until it's renewed.
• If the number isn't on file, we'll reject the campaign with the reason and you can resubmit once it's listed — see the Prohibited Items List for the rules.

How to set one up

1. Create a campaign from the Club shop template — it sets the campaign type to product sales and gives you a 21-day order window to edit.
2. Add gear from a business's catalogue (they print and ship, you keep the margin) or list items the club already owns.
3. Ask your supplier to add a required Size option to each garment — there's a one-click “Standard clothing sizes” button on their product form. Buyers then can't check out without choosing a size, and you see it on the order.
4. Set the order close date, then share the shop link with members.

What happens on an order. The buyer pays through the checkout and the supplier is paid directly — Generosity never holds the money, and neither does the club. The club's margin is paid to the club by the supplier on top of the sale, and appears in your dashboard. Orders close on your chosen date, so the supplier does one print run and nobody is left with unsold stock.

Tell your members when it arrives. Most NZ club gear lands about two weeks after the window closes — put that date in your story so nobody has to ask.

Not sure what to send a printer? Look at the sample club shop — a whole shop filled in with example gear, prices, sizes and the print run behind it. Show them that instead of explaining it.

• Pickup — add a pickup location so buyers know where to collect.
• Courier — add metro and rural delivery charges if you charge for shipping.
• Local delivery — describe the area you cover (e.g. within 20 km of Christchurch CBD).
• Digital — for vouchers; nothing to ship.

• Set the delivery or collection date.
• Choose the courier (NZ Post / CourierPost, Aramex, or Other) and enter the tracking number.
• Click Save & notify to email the buyer the update, or mark the order shipped / complete.

• One-off gifts are charged once and receipted straight away.
• Monthly gifts keep going until you stop them — each one gets its own receipt, and the fundraiser can see the support as it arrives.
• To stop or restart one, use My purchases → Recurring donations in your dashboard — see Managing a recurring donation.

• Sign in and open My purchases, then the Recurring donations section at the top. (Gave as a guest? Sign in with the same email — your receipt has a link to set a password.)
• Press Cancel this next to the gift you want to stop. It ends at the end of the current period — you won't be charged again, and nothing is taken back from the fundraiser.
• Changed your mind? The same page shows Resume until that date passes.

The page can stop and restart a gift; it can't yet change the amount or the card on an existing one. Email support@generous.nz and we'll sort that — or cancel one set up with an email you no longer use.

Cancelling a recurring gift doesn't unsubscribe you from the campaign's update emails; those have their own unsubscribe link at the bottom of every update.

• Donations and items the fundraiser sells themselves are paid to the fundraiser.
• Wholesale items are paid to the supplying business (they're the seller of record and they fulfil the order). The business then pays the fundraiser's share automatically from a card they save once.
• Receipts show the seller's name — the business for wholesale items, the fundraiser otherwise.
• The platform fee is not taken from the payment. It's invoiced to the fundraiser separately (see “Understanding platform fees”).

• Wholesale items are sold and fulfilled by the supplying business. Their name shows on the listing, on the Stripe checkout page and on your receipt, and your purchase contract is with them.
• Everything else is sold by the fundraiser or organisation who listed it.
• We run the platform only. We never receive or hold your payment, so we are not the seller and cannot refund a payment ourselves.

If a business closes or stops trading before your order arrives, your claim is against that business. Refunds and chargebacks come from their Stripe balance — and if that isn't enough, Stripe may attempt to debit their bank account. You can also raise a chargeback with your card issuer; keep your receipt, and contact us — we'll suspend their listings and send you the order and fulfilment records we hold.

See the Refund Policy for the detail.

• Fundraisers get a fee-free start. Their first slice of fundraising carries no platform fee — $250 as standard, and more while a sign-up offer is running (the sign-up page shows the current amount). Signing up in time earns the bigger credit, and it never expires. Your dashboard shows exactly what is left, and a coupon can add to it (see Discount and coupon codes). After that the 5% + GST fee is invoiced weekly and charged automatically to the payment card you save in your dashboard — nothing is ever taken out of a donation.
• You don't need a card to get started. A connected payout account is all that's needed to go live, so you can raise from day one. Fees only start once your fee-free allowance is used up; anything owed is recorded and settled automatically the moment you add a card. Your dashboard shows the amount owing, and we'll email you a reminder (once per billing period at most) rather than block your page.
• Donors can choose to “cover fees”, which adds the fee amount to their gift so the fundraiser keeps more of it.
• Businesses pay the fundraiser's share (minimum 10%) from a card they save once, plus a 5% + GST platform fee on the sales generated through fundraisers — invoiced weekly and charged to the same card. Your first slice of sales is free — $1,000 as standard, more during a promotion (no platform fee), credit can be applied, and there's no charge if there are no sales.

• We batch the fundraiser's share and automatically generate an invoice from the fundraiser to you.
• The invoice is charged to the payment card you add once in Billing (Dashboard → Wholesale → Billing).
• The money goes straight to the fundraiser's Stripe account — it never passes through us.
• You also receive a separate weekly platform-fee invoice (5% + GST of sales generated), charged to the same card.
• Refunded or disputed orders cancel the fundraiser's share on that order.
• Direct sales: if a buyer purchases your product straight from the catalogue (no fundraiser), the share is paid to the Generous.nz Community Campaign using the same automatic invoicing. If the buyer came via a fundraiser that added your product, that fundraiser gets the share instead.

Add your card in Billing.

• The buyer is emailed the voucher code(s) automatically, with a printable page and a PDF download.
• Codes are single-use — once sold, they are never reused.
• The voucher shows what it's for, who it's from (the business), the fundraiser it supports, how to redeem, and the conditions.
• Gift purchases email the voucher to the recipient too.

• The seller's name is on the listing, at checkout and on your receipt. Wholesale items are sold and delivered by the business; everything else by the fundraiser. Nothing is sold by Generous.nz itself.
• Vouchers arrive by email the moment you pay, with a printable page and a PDF. Buying one as a gift? Add the recipient's name, email and a message, and they get it too.
• Delivery charges (metro or rural) are worked out from your postcode at checkout, and pickup or local delivery is shown on the listing.
• Every order lands in My purchases, with courier tracking and your voucher codes.

• Sign in and open My purchases (in your dashboard menu) to see every order: item, campaign, amount and status.
• Delivery — expected date and address, courier, tracking number and a direct track link.
• Vouchers — your codes, gift details, how to redeem, and "Download PDF" / "View & print" buttons.
• Bought something as a guest before? Signing up with the same email links those orders to your account automatically.

• Apply from your dashboard (For businesses) — free to list, no charges until you have sales.
• Set your sale price and minimum share (10%+), plus voucher codes and redemption details for vouchers.
• Fundraisers browse the catalogue and add your items to their store in one click.
• You get each order with the buyer's details, mark it fulfilled, and add courier tracking.
• Buy now: anyone can also buy a product directly from its catalogue page without a fundraiser. The business still receives the payment and fulfils the order; the share on that direct sale supports the Generous.nz Community Campaign.
• Signed-in fundraisers see a "Sell & make up to $X" figure on each product, showing what they'd earn per sale at the minimum price.

• Wholesaler application approved — apply from your dashboard; the application is reviewed (AI-screened and human-approved) before you can list anything.
• Stripe payout account connected — without it, no order can ever be placed.
• Payment card added — platform fees and fundraiser shares are charged to it automatically; without it, items can't go live.

• Free sales. The first slice of your lifetime sales carries no platform fee — $1,000 as standard, or the bigger amount offered when you signed up during a promotion. It applies automatically as you sell; there is nothing to claim.
• Referral free sales. When a business you referred joins and completes its go-live setup, you earn $200 of free sales on your own account. It stacks on top of your starting allowance and doesn't expire — keep referring and it keeps growing.
• Fee credit. We sometimes put a dollar credit on an account (a promotion or goodwill). Credit is applied to the fee and GST before your saved card is charged, and whatever isn't needed carries over to the next invoice.

One thing to know: if you joined with a wholesale discount code, that code's percentage replaces the free-sales offer while it's active — they don't stack. When the code expires, the standard free-sales offer applies again.

Your standing is shown in Dashboard → Wholesale → Billing: how much free-sales volume is left, any referral balance, and any credit on the account.

• Tick a cause and your items are hidden from fundraisers raising for that cause — they can't add your offers to their store.
• Tick Generous.nz Community Campaign and your items won't be offered for direct purchase on the public catalogue, but fundraisers can still sell them.
• Fundraisers never see the reason — excluded items just don't appear for the causes you've ticked.

• Add a How to redeem note (the exact steps buyers follow) and conditions — both are shown on the buyer's voucher.
• Generate voucher codes or paste your own in bulk; every code is single-use. Prefer hands-free? Switch on auto-generated codes and a fresh unique code is minted automatically for every sale (up to your stock).
• When a voucher sells, the buyer gets the code by email with a printable and PDF voucher; you see the sale in Voucher sales.
• Mark codes redeemed as customers use them, so you always know what's outstanding.

You can export your orders as a CSV anytime for your own system or shipping labels.

To receive money on Generous.nz you connect a Stripe account — the same safe system used by thousands of NZ businesses. Stripe is legally required to verify anyone who receives money, so onboarding asks a few more questions than a typical sign-up. It usually takes about 10–15 minutes, done once.

What you'll need ready:

• Your full legal name and date of birth
• Your home address, email and phone number
• A NZ driver licence or passport (for identity verification)
• Your NZ bank account details for payouts
• Your IRD number, if requested
• A short description of your activity — e.g. “fundraising / selling goods for a cause” (choose “individual / sole trader” if you're not a business)

Steps:

1. Sign in and open your dashboard.
2. Click Connect your payout account (Stripe).
3. Complete Stripe's hosted onboarding — Stripe collects your details and identity documents directly and runs the checks itself (KYC/AML).
4. Wait for verification — usually minutes, sometimes a day or two.
5. Start receiving donations and sales. Money pays out to your bank account on Stripe's schedule.
6. Add your payment card from the dashboard when you're ready — it's charged automatically for your weekly 5% + GST platform fees. You don't need it to go live: fees only start once your fee-free allowance is used up, and anything owing is settled automatically once the card is in.

Good to know: Generous.nz uses Stripe Connect Standard accounts with Stripe-hosted onboarding. You never hand your bank details or ID to Generous.nz — Stripe collects them directly and the platform never sees them. This is the lowest-friction setup Stripe offers for fundraisers. Businesses and wholesalers follow the same flow; they're asked for company details instead, and they also add a payment card in their Billing settings that's used to pay the fundraiser's share automatically.

If the button still says “Connect your payout account” after onboarding, the verification may still be pending — click it to continue where you left off. If you get stuck, contact support@generous.nz.

Stripe is legally required to verify anyone who receives money (anti-money-laundering / know-your-customer laws). Because fundraisers receive payments, Stripe treats them like a seller — even if you're just selling cookies for a school trip.

The verification exists to protect everyone:

• You — only you can receive the money; it can't be diverted to someone else.
• Donors and buyers — they know the money goes to a real, verified person or organisation.
• The platform — it keeps fraudsters and money laundering off the site.

Your bank details are used only for payouts. Your identity documents are used only by Stripe to verify who you are — Generous.nz never stores or sees them.

The Payments setup page (Admin → Payments setup) is the platform owner's Stripe health check. It shows configuration status without ever revealing secrets:

• Secret key — whether Stripe keys are set and valid (they live in .env on the server).
• Webhook secret — whether the payment webhook signing secret is configured.
• Webhook events — the list of events Stripe must send (payments, refunds, disputes and invoices — including events from sellers' connected accounts). Missing events appear as warnings.
• Connected accounts — fundraisers' and wholesalers' Stripe onboarding status, with a Refresh account status action to re-check after someone completes onboarding.

Use this page when payments aren't working: check the keys first, then the webhook events, then the connected account status. The full manual configuration guide is in docs/stripe-setup.md.

• Branding: logo, cover image and a brand colour — pick one of the presets (Forest, Ocean, Sunset, Royal, Berry) or enter your own hex colour.
• What supporters see: your logo and blurb, your total raised, your badges (like Verified charity) and every approved campaign with its progress bar.
• Custom domain: add it in organisation settings and point the DNS at us — the storefront is then served on your own address.
• Only approved campaigns appear. Drafts, and anything still in review, stay private to your team.

Drafts are always written for Generous.nz: they never mention or link another website, and they tell supporters to give on your page here — not anywhere else.

• Banned items (weapons, drugs, stolen goods, counterfeits) are stopped immediately and held for a person, with the reason recorded — nothing is rejected automatically.
• The AI reads your title, story or listing plus the account behind it, then scores the risk. Low-risk items are approved automatically and go live moments after you save.
• Anything unclear — or anything that looks like an attempt to get around the banned list — goes to the human moderation queue with the reason shown.
• Raffles are the exception. The AI never approves a raffle campaign or its tickets, however clean it looks. A person always checks the licence number against the register before a raffle can go live.
• Anything already flagged always waits for a person. If our word check or the AI has raised a question about an item, the AI won't approve it over the top of that — a person clears the question first. That includes a prize draw, raffle, lottery or sweepstake described in a campaign that isn't set up as a raffle: games of chance need a licence under NZ law, so a person always checks.
• Editing something that's already live sends it back for a fresh check.

Never trusted on the tick alone. Ticking the box doesn't put a badge on your page — until we've confirmed the number your page shows a neutral “charity status: being checked” note. Raising money for a charity is different from being one: leave the box unticked and say who you're supporting in your story, with their permission.

• Your fundraiser pages stay online but show taking a break until <date>, and donations and orders are turned off — including anyone who tries to pay directly.
• Your shop, tickets, raffles and supporter subscriptions sections are hidden while you're paused.
• Nothing is deleted. Your pages, listings, orders and history are exactly as you left them, and everything reopens automatically on the date you chose.
• You'll see a banner in your dashboard while it's on, with a link to end it early.

One thing to watch: if you have monthly supporter subscriptions running, those are handled by Stripe and keep charging while you're paused. If you want them to stop, cancel them before you pause (or get in touch and we'll help).

If you can delete straight away: your account is removed. Fundraiser pages are archived and hidden from the site, listings are withdrawn, and your name, email, password, passkeys and saved payment card are cleared. You'll be signed out.

If money or recent sales are still in play, we hold the deletion back and put your account into holiday mode instead, so buyers and invoices are still looked after. That happens when you have:

• unpaid platform fee or business invoices;
• payouts, or wholesale shares, still on their way to you;
• paid orders you haven't marked as shipped or complete;
• any sales, purchases or donations in the last 30 days — buyers can still ask for a refund in that window.

When that happens you'll see the exact list of what's outstanding and the date you can come back and delete — usually 30 days after your last sale. Deleting then works the same way.

What we keep. Orders, donations and invoices are retained after deletion because GST and consumer law require the financial record to be kept. Your personal details are removed from them, so they no longer identify you.

Changed your mind, or need something removed sooner? Email hello@generous.nz and we'll sort it out.

• every campaign goes back to draft (you can still see it, nobody else can);
• listings and shop items are hidden from your pages;
• wholesale catalogue items are paused, and the business no longer appears in the catalogue;
• supporter pages stop taking donations, and checkout refuses donations and orders for that account even if someone has a direct link.

Existing paid orders still get fulfilled and paid out — suspension doesn't rewrite money that has already moved.

Coming back. When an account is reinstated, we put back exactly what came down — nothing more. If you (or the Stripe guard) changed or paused something in the meantime, it stays where it is.

Think it's a mistake? Email hello@generous.nz — every suspension is queued for a person to review, and you can ask us to take another look at any time.

• Fundraiser referrals: the new fundraiser gets a fee-free start ($250 as standard, more during a promotion), and you earn $50 of fee-free fundraising volume once they complete setup.
• Business referrals: the new business gets a fee-free sales start ($1,000 as standard, more during a promotion), and you earn $200 of fee-free sales volume.
• Anyone who clicks your link is tracked for 5 days — if they sign up within that window, the referral counts. The first link they open is the one that counts: later links never overwrite it.
• Your link opens a dedicated landing page that explains the offer and bonus, with a button straight to the sign-up form.
• Find your link, click stats and rewards on the Refer a fundraiser or Refer a business page in your dashboard.

If you need our company details — for a grant application, a receipt, your accounts, or your own checks — here they are:

• Registered name: Web Studio Ltd
• Based in: Ōtautahi Christchurch, New Zealand
• Registered: 15 August 2002
• Company number: 1232732
• NZBN: 9429036370351
• Companies Office record: view the registration

A note on money, since it matters when you're handing over donations: the company runs the platform, but it never holds your funds. Payments are processed by Stripe and paid straight to the fundraiser's or business's own verified bank account, and the platform only ever invoices its own fee.

Questions about any of this? Email hello@generous.nz — you'll get a person, not a script.