Help
Who to ask, and the questions we are asked most. Written for donors, cafés and referral partners.
One address, monitored by the fund: fund@payitforward.org. There is no phone queue and no ticket number — Pay It Forward is one or two people, and an email reaches them.
If a card is not working at a counter right now, the café can serve the meal anyway and tell us afterwards. Nobody should wait on an email to eat.
Where does my money go? Into one pooled fund that reimburses cafés for meals already served. You are not buying a specific meal for a specific person, and you will never be told who ate it.
Do I get a receipt? Yes, by email, once the payment settles. It acknowledges your gift. Pay It Forward is not yet endorsed as a deductible gift recipient, so the receipt makes no claim about deductibility — when that changes, receipts change with it.
Can I cancel a monthly gift? Yes, at any time, by replying to any receipt. No reason needed and nobody will ask for one.
When am I paid? Weekly, against taps the server authorised — never against anything you have to claim or count. Your dashboard shows what is owed and what has been paid.
A card was declined. Serve the meal if you judge it right, and tell us. The screen never says why in front of the customer, and neither should you — the reason is ours to sort out, not theirs to explain.
Our bank details changed. Email us; we send a single-use link. We will never ask for account details by reply, and we never ask for them over the phone.
We want to stop. Tell us and we stop. No notice period, no penalty, and we do not announce it.
What do you need from us about a person? Nothing. No name, no date of birth, no case number. You issue a card; we never learn who holds it.
What if a card is lost or misused? Kill it from your portal and issue another. It takes effect on the next tap, and the person is never told they were suspected of anything.
What happens when our budget runs out? Cards stop being approved and we email you before that happens. Cards already issued are never retrospectively cancelled.
Nobody is ever asked why they are using the card — not by us, not at the counter, not afterwards. A free meal is meant to be indistinguishable from a paid one, and every rule above exists to keep it that way.
More on why: the story behind this.