JustGiving is the best-known fundraising platform in the UK, and for peer-to-peer fundraising pages (someone running a marathon for you) it does a job Tinwell does not try to do. This page is about the other thing charities use JustGiving for: taking direct donations from their own website. For that, the comparison is between a hosted platform that charges a monthly fee plus a processing fee on most gifts, and a plugin that runs on your own WordPress site for a fixed yearly licence. The figures below are JustGiving’s published UK prices, checked on 16 October 2026.
The short version
| JustGivingGrow plan | Tinwell | |
|---|---|---|
| Subscription | £39 + VAT a month£561.60 a year | £249 + VAT a year£298.80 a year |
| Per donation | 1.9% + 30p | Nothing to Tinwell.Stripe’s 1.5% + 20p, paid to Stripe |
| Where the donor pays | On justgiving.com | On your website |
| Donor data | In your JustGiving account, exported | In your WordPress database and your CRM, in real time |
| Gift Aid | Claimed by JustGiving on your behalf, for 5% of the Gift Aid | Declarations captured on your form, CSV export for HMRC, you claim |
| Regular giving | Monthly gifts by card | Monthly by card, or Direct Debit through GoCardless |
| Peer-to-peer fundraising pages | ✓Its core strength | – |
Rather see Tinwell than read about it? Open the live demo to try the donation form, the donor portal and the admin dashboard with sample data.
What JustGiving costs a charity
JustGiving has two plans for charities. Start has no subscription. Grow, which adds donor details to your reports, is £15 + VAT a month for charities raising up to £15,000 a year including Gift Aid, and £39 + VAT a month above that. The figures here use Grow at £39 + VAT a month, so £561.60 a year including VAT. On top of the subscription, every donation carries a processing fee of 1.9% + 30p. That fee covers card processing, so it is fair to compare it with Stripe’s rate rather than with a platform fee alone.
One exception matters. JustGiving’s Giving Checkout, the donation form or button a charity can use for direct donations, charges no platform or processing fee. It is funded by donors’ optional contributions, and JustGiving covers the cost when a donor adds nothing. A charity that takes most of its online gifts through Giving Checkout pays mainly the subscription, which can work out cheaper than a Tinwell licence plus Stripe. Giving Checkout is on both of JustGiving’s plans, but you get the donor data on Grow. The worked example below uses the standard 1.9% + 30p; JustGiving fees explained goes through both cases.
JustGiving claims Gift Aid on your behalf for donations made through it, which is convenient, and it charges 5% of the Gift Aid it claims for that service, which is not included in the figures here. Donors are also invited to add a tip to JustGiving when they give; that comes from the donor rather than the charity, but it is part of the experience your supporter has.
What Tinwell costs
A Tinwell licence is £249 + VAT a year for one website, which is £298.80. Donations go straight into your own Stripe account, and Stripe charges its standard UK rate, 1.5% + 20p at the time of writing, which you pay Stripe directly. Tinwell takes nothing per gift. Everything is on the pricing page.
A worked example at £60,000 a year
Suppose your charity raises £60,000 a year through its website in 2,000 gifts averaging £30.
| Yearly cost | JustGivingGrow plan | Tinwellwith Stripe |
|---|---|---|
| Subscription or licence | £561.60£39 + VAT × 12 months | £298.80£249 + VAT |
| Percentage on £60,000 | £1,140.001.9% of £60,000 | £900.001.5% of £60,000 |
| Fixed fee on 2,000 gifts | £600.0030p × 2,000 gifts | £400.0020p × 2,000 gifts |
| Total | £2,301.60 | £1,598.80 |
| Extra kept for the cause with Tinwell | £702.80 |
That is £702.80 a year kept for the cause, and against JustGiving, Tinwell pays for its own licence in about 15 weeks and 4 days. The gap grows with income: at £120,000 a year it is £1,142.80, and at £250,000 it is £2,096.13. At £30,000 it is still £482.80. Try your own figures on the fee calculator.
JustGiving’s Grow plan (£39 + VAT a month for charities raising over £15,000 a year) with its 1.9% + 30p processing fee. Tinwell is the licence including VAT plus Stripe’s standard UK card rate of 1.5% + 20p. Per-donation pence fees assume an average gift of £30. Not counted: Gift Aid processing fees, donor tips and surcharges on premium or non-UK cards. Logos and names belong to their owners.
Where the donor goes
Fees are the easy part of the comparison. The part that changes results is where the donor is when they pay. With a hosted platform, a “Donate” button on your site sends the supporter to a page on justgiving.com. Some of them will not arrive: every redirect loses people, and a different domain, a different look and a login prompt lose more. Those who do arrive finish the gift in JustGiving’s branding, with JustGiving’s tip request, and are then offered JustGiving’s own suggestions. Your site’s analytics see a click on a button and nothing after it.
With Tinwell the whole donation happens on your page. The form takes its fonts from your theme, the URL stays yours, Apple Pay and Google Pay are right there, and your analytics see the full funnel, including where people drop out so you can fix it. The donor’s memory of the gift is of your charity, not of a platform.
Who holds the donor relationship
On JustGiving the donor record lives in your JustGiving account, and you export it to get it into your CRM. Consent for you to contact the donor is something the donor grants on JustGiving’s form. With Tinwell the donor record is in your own database from the moment the gift is made, with the consent they gave on your form, and if you use Beacon, Donorfy or Raisely it is in your CRM within seconds, merged into the existing household. If you ever stop using Tinwell, nothing leaves with it.
Gift Aid
JustGiving claiming Gift Aid for you is a genuine convenience, especially for a charity with no finance support. Tinwell takes the other approach: it captures the declaration on your form with the HMRC wording, stores it against the donor and the gift, and gives you a CSV export laid out for HMRC Charities Online so your claim is a matter of uploading a file. You keep control of what is claimed, when, and the records that back it up, and there is no fee on the Gift Aid itself. The Gift Aid guide covers it step by step.
Regular giving
Regular gifts are where most charity income growth comes from, and they are where cards let you down: a card expires, a payment fails, and the gift quietly stops. Tinwell offers Direct Debit through GoCardless on the same form as cards, so a monthly donor can give the way they pay their other bills. Donors also get a portal where they can change or pause their gift themselves. See the Direct Debit page.
When JustGiving is the right choice
If most of your income comes from supporters fundraising on your behalf, with sponsorship pages, events and challenges, JustGiving’s network and its sponsor pages are hard to replace, and Tinwell does not try to. Many charities use both: JustGiving for peer-to-peer fundraising and Tinwell for direct donations on their own site, which is where the fee saving and the donor relationship matter most. If you raise under £15,000 a year online, check JustGiving’s entry-level plan against the figures here before deciding.
Moving from JustGiving to your own site
You do not need to close your JustGiving account to start. Install Tinwell, connect your Stripe account, place the form on your donate page and run a £1 test. Then point your site’s donate buttons and your next email appeal at your own page and watch the funnel in Tinwell’s analytics. Our team will do the set-up for you with the free onboarding add-on at checkout, and the docs cover it if you prefer to do it yourself.
See pricing, compare with Donorbox, Enthuse, CAF Donate, GiveWP or Charitable, or take the product tour.