Charity Navigator charges no administrative fees. While Give Lively’s fundraising platform is free for nonprofits, the Giving Basket is a paid service. Give Lively charges a 2.5% platform fee to power the Giving Basket.

In addition, there are fees charged by the third-party services used to process and disburse each donation are as follows (as of July 2025):

• 0.8% (with a cap of $5, no matter how large the donation) for ACH/bank transfers
• 2.2% + $0.30 for major credit cards, including Visa, MasterCard, Discover, Diner Club and JCB 
• 3.5% for American Express
• 1.99% + $0.49 for PayPal and Venmo
• $1.01 check processing fee per monthly check: this is subtracted from the lump-sum check, applied proportionally across all donations included in the check (see the “Fractional Disbursement Fee” column in your CSV export of donor data).
  

These third-party service fees are based on special nonprofit rates offered by Stripe and PayPal, the primary payment processors. All nonprofits receiving donations via the Giving Basket automatically benefit from these special rates through Give Lively. Standard rates are slightly different. 

All fees are automatically deducted from each donation by Give Lively and the third-party payment processors. That said, donors have the option of covering these fees (as an additional tax-deductible gift) during the Giving Basket checkout. Note that, at present, donors are not able to cover the check processing fee.