Vanco (Payment Software)

Introduction to Vanco

Vanco offers online payment services that are primarily tailored for faith organizations, educational institutions, childcare organizations, and non-profit organizations. It has a variety of tools that cater to a range of organizations and business needs. Vanco Services was founded in 1998 in Minneapolis. Since then, they have grown to serve more than 40,000 churches, faith-based groups, nonprofits, schools, and educational organizations. Vanco Services has also launched new initiatives over the past few years, including Vanco Mobile so users can access its services through a free mobile app in 2020 and Vanco Live to encourage interactions while livestreaming in 2021. They strive to make their platform easy to use and manage while providing their support team as a resource.

Key Features by Organization:

Faith Organizations & Non-Profits

• Online giving page to simplify online donations for churches and implement it on their websites
• Mobile Church App for users to access Vanco’s services through a mobile app
• Event ticketing to allow online ticketing, registration, and event planning
• Text-to-Give to allow one-time gifts or recurring donations through a text message
• In-Stream Online Giving to transform the online church experience with access to a simplified online donation system
• Credit Card Swipe Reader for in-person payments

K-12 Schools

• Online school payment system for a variety of school activities
• Contactless cafeteria food service to streamline cafeteria purchases
• A secure and quick way to streamline
• Event ticketing to organize and promote virtual and in-person events
• Online registration and class management for school attendance, schedules, and reports

Child care & Community Education

• Registration system to automate tasks, such as online enrollment and waitlists
• Attendance system to track student attendance with a touchless check-in and check-out
• Payment services to handle online bills and payments for both the childcare and parents
• Event ticketing to manage in-person and virtual events offering free or paid tickets online with customizable pages
• Streamline program needs into one product: attendance, transcripts, schedules, availability, payments, reports

Customer Support

Vanco is dedicated to providing resources and assistance to its customers. It has a team of experts who can be reached via phone or email from 7:30 AM to 6:00 PM every day. They also offer a library of resources for self-service support and access to helpful material. However, based on reviews and our own experience, customer support and Vanco’s responsiveness seemed to be lacking.

Pricing

Vanco offers different pricing plans to tailor to different needs. It does not require a contract and does not have any cancellation fees. All plans offer free event management for free events, online giving, mobile app, implementation support, 60+ ChMS integrations, 24/7 U.S.-based support, data security and compliance, giving launch materials, and an option to purchase a kiosk hardware or mobile card reader at a one-time cost that varies by device.

Grow Plan

• $0/month
• Debit/Credit Card Rate of 2.90% with a $0.45 fee per transaction
• ACH Processing Rate of 1.00% with a $0.45 fee per transaction
• Paid Event Management needs to call for pricing
• Text-to-give is available at $10/month
• Monthly fee of $10 if organizations do not complete their first meeting with a Vanco Giving Specialist within 15 days and do not have their Vanco online giving page live on their website within 30 days

Thrive Plan

• $49/month
• Debit/Credit Card Rate of 2.65% with a $0.39 fee per transaction
• ACH Processing Rate of 0.90% with a $0.39 fee per transaction
• Paid Event Management needs to call for pricing
• Text-to-give included in the plan
• Streaming option
• Kiosk App

Custom Plan

• Needs to call for pricing for Debit/Credit Card Rate, ACH Processing Rate, Paid Event Management, Text-to-give, and Streaming

Additional Fees

• American Express Credit Card Rate it 3.5%
• $25 fee per chargeback
• ACH returns and credits are charged $5/transactions
• A PCI non-compliance fee of $23.95 will be charged monthly if not compliant with industry data security standards

Advantages of the Solution

• Works well with non-profits, especially churches
• There is no set-up cost
• There is no monthly use fee for the introductory plan
• Great Functionality
• Easy to set up (they just provided a link that we added to the button on a website)
• They offer a demo free of cost
• They have pre-built administrator videos and documentation

Disadvantages of the Solution     

• Based on personal experience, Vanco was difficult to communicate with
• They are not a mainstream solution like Square, so they have a less robust user base and less organizational support
• Based on some reviews that we found, people have been double-charged
• Not easily customizable

Tips For Using Vanco in the Future

• Talk to them as early as possible. The generic emails that they provide seem fairly responsive. We had trouble talking to a specific agent.
• Nearly all changes that you may want to make will require talking to personnel at Vanco or filling out one of their forms. For example, you can’t change images for your personal payment page without filling out a form.