Trouble making a donation from outside US

Please fill out the following sections to the best of your ability, it will help us investigate bugs if we have this information at the outset. Screenshots are especially helpful, so please provide those if you can.

Platform: Website

Browser: Firefox, Safari

URL: https://www.inaturalist.org/donate?utm_campaign=2021-july&utm_medium=dashboard-header&utm_source=inaturalist.org&utm_content=button-become-donor&utm_term=720

Description of problem

Step 1: I fill in my details to make a recurring donation via credit card, and complete the captcha

Step 2: The website tells me “card declined”

Step 3: I call my bank, and they say it is likely because I have a US card with an overseas address, and the system won’t accept my zip code of more than 5 digits (nor 00000)

I believe the issue is that my overseas postal code is 8 digits, plus a hyphen, but the zip code field on the donation form only accepts 5 digits. Is there an alternative way to make a donation, via Paypal or by phone, for example?

1 Like

Hi @deboas, thanks for trying to support iNaturalist and sorry you’re running into that issue! When you get to the payment section, you should see the option to donate via PayPal (or bank account) instead of using a card. Here’s a screenshot of what that should look like.

If that doesn’t work, please let me know. Sometimes we’re able to override some overzealous protections via Stripe (the card processor), but we’d have to coordinate that over email. You can always direct donation questions to donations@inaturalist.org (which forwards to me).

2 Likes

Ah! Thank you, I don’t know how I missed that. I used Paypal and it worked. Many thanks!

1 Like