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Chariot DAF Portal (SSN requirement)

  • 1.  Chariot DAF Portal (SSN requirement)

    Posted 03-02-2026 09:12 AM

    Has anyone felt uncomfortable providing their SSN # to Chariot in order to facilitate receiving a DAF payment?  We aren't Chariot customers, but a donor has facilitated a gift to our university through them and will not transfer funds to us without our signing up Chariot with our employee's SSN for the person.  Our other DAF providers (Fidelity, Vanguard, etc.) never request this.  Is this a legit request to protect their interest/security, but then potentially put our employee's SSN at risk?



    ------------------------------
    James Holzbach
    Trinity University
    jholzbac@trinity.edu
    ------------------------------


  • 2.  RE: Chariot DAF Portal (SSN requirement)

    Posted 03-02-2026 09:16 AM
    You should be able to provide your EIN. That is a fairly common requirement for many funders. I would not share an employees SSN.

    John Taylor Principal, John H. Taylor Consulting, LLC 919.816.5903 Big ideas; small keyboard





  • 3.  RE: Chariot DAF Portal (SSN requirement)

    Posted 03-02-2026 10:39 AM
    Hello,

    I am curious to know how other colleagues get around this requested requirement. Fidelity Marketplace requires an SSN for logins with Stripe and I believe Paypal has very personal identification rules for individuals as well. I am unsure of others, but I know they exist.

    @John are you saying to just provide the EIN instead of the SSN when they request those details?

    Karen
    Karen A. Sims-Harrell, M.Ed.
    Director, Advancement Gift Processing
    National Geographic Society
    Advancement Operations






    Original Message


  • 4.  RE: Chariot DAF Portal (SSN requirement)

    Posted 03-02-2026 10:55 AM
    Yes, that is what I am suggesting, and if that does not work, call the vendor.

    Only Venmo, back in the day, required an SSN before allowing nonprofit organizations to create an account. I've haven't found a vendor that refused an EIN yet (but some need a "talking to." For DAFs, they only need to verify that the payment is made to a qualified organization. An EIN does that.

    John

    John H. Taylor, Principal
    John H. Taylor Consulting, LLC
    2604 Sevier Street
    Durham, NC     27705

    919.816.5903 (cell/text)

    Serving the Advancement Community Since 1987





    Original Message


  • 5.  RE: Chariot DAF Portal (SSN requirement)

    Posted 03-02-2026 11:08 AM
    I think with Chariot, you have to supply the EIN in addition to the SSN for whoever the person is that will serve as the account owner/control person. We considered signing up at one point but did not go through with it. At a previous organization, we had to do a similar process to implement PayPal.

    CJ Jones

    Associate Director, Development Operations

    765-220-9575

    AmericanRivers.org

    Instagram  |  Facebook  |  Twitter

    American Rivers is proud to have a Four-Star Rating from Charity Navigator.

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    Original Message


  • 6.  RE: Chariot DAF Portal (SSN requirement)

    Posted 03-02-2026 06:19 PM
    That is correct, CJ.

    At our organization, either the CFO or the President is the account owner for the merchant gateway and they were required to share personal credentials (SSN or Driver's License) in addition to EIN and 501c3 letter for both PayPal and Stripe.  The account owner can then add other users for day-to-day access and reporting.

    There should be an easier way.

    Best, Martha
    The Legal Defense Fund
    New York, NY



    Original Message


  • 7.  RE: Chariot DAF Portal (SSN requirement)

    Posted 03-03-2026 08:16 AM
    Hi Martha,
    I did reach out to Giving Block, the organization that connects us to Chariot. They indicated that, if we aren't willing to provide the info, we will eventually just get paper checks for DAF gifts with a fee of 10% capped at $25. Not sure if that constitutes an easier (or better) way in your view, but it is an alternative. I also don't know if that fee applies to all situations/organizations since our direct relationship is with Giving Block, who is then using Chariot.

    Thanks,

    John Smilde

    Director of Development Operations | Cato Institute

    1000 Massachusetts Avenue NW, Washington, DC 20001

    jsmilde@cato.org

    202.216.1451




    Original Message


  • 8.  RE: Chariot DAF Portal (SSN requirement)

    Posted 03-03-2026 08:47 AM
    That makes no sense, John. They are still distributing funds with or without the SSN. Have you contacted Chariot directly to get a fuller explanation?

    John Taylor Principal, John H. Taylor Consulting, LLC 919.816.5903 Big ideas; small keyboard





    Original Message


  • 9.  RE: Chariot DAF Portal (SSN requirement)

    Posted 03-03-2026 09:04 AM
    Federal 'Know Your Customer" (KYC) regulations require financial institutions and money transmitters like Stripe to verify the identity of individuals operating on behalf of an entity. This is part of the Patriot Act, and in most cases, no alternative method is allowed. This isn't about any specific DAF or giving platform, it's just the reality of electronic payments. Best practices call for having a C-suite officer or a trustee provide this information. It is also important to have procedures in place to update this information when people transition out of the organization, because accounts can be suspended, and payouts held, and reclaiming access to these accounts once they are lost.

    The DAF can send a check without needing your SSN because your bank is responsible for following KYC rules, which they do when you create an account there. 

    Thank you,
    Isaac Shalev
    Data Strategy Expert
    Sage70, Inc.
    (917) 859-0151
    isaac@sage70.com

    Schedule a 30-minute consultation now:





    Original Message


  • 10.  RE: Chariot DAF Portal (SSN requirement)

    Posted 03-03-2026 09:05 AM
    John,
    Here is the information I received from the Giving Block. Lots of word salad but explains where they are coming from. No, I haven't contacted Chariot because we only have an incidental relationship with them in that we have a relationship with Giving Block, and they decided to contract with Chariot for the DAF functionality. The Chariot DAF functionality exists for us but has scarcely, if ever been used by our donors. It was mostly "throw-in functionality" added to our core service relationship of receiving crypto. So, not investing too much more into it. See the explanation below:

    "I definitely understand the hesitation to share this type of sensitive information. Unfortunately, it is part of the upgraded compliance protocol Chariot instituted. It comes after a lot of work by their legal and compliance team, in partnership with their various financial institutions and community foundation partners.

     Identify verification of a control person is a standard requirement for payment gateways, done as part of the federal legal requirements for Know Your Client "KYC" checks. One of the legal requirements is that Chariot collects the SSN or ITIN of every customer during the onboarding process to help verify their identity. This information is used by their identity verification provider, Footprint, to run their KYC checks. Footprint also takes this very seriously and stores all data in secure enclaves.

     Most importantly, Chariot added these checks to make sure they know that only your organization can get access to the data and payments that can arrive to you via Chariot."

    Thanks,

    John Smilde

    Director of Development Operations | Cato Institute

    1000 Massachusetts Avenue NW, Washington, DC 20001

    jsmilde@cato.org

    202.216.1451




    Original Message


  • 11.  RE: Chariot DAF Portal (SSN requirement)

    Posted 03-03-2026 10:26 AM
    Thanks for this.

    John H. Taylor, Principal
    John H. Taylor Consulting, LLC
    2604 Sevier Street
    Durham, NC     27705

    919.816.5903 (cell/text)

    Serving the Advancement Community Since 1987





    Original Message


  • 12.  RE: Chariot DAF Portal (SSN requirement)

    Posted 03-02-2026 11:07 AM
    Hi James,
    My understanding is that, if you refuse, you can still use their service to direct DAF gifts to you, but that it will be via paper check and will incur an administrative fee. In addition, there could be delays of up to 60 days before the check is sent. So, by refusing, you don't cut yourself off from their service, but rather, you may lose the ACH option.
    They have started providing this service in conjunction with Giving Block, which many organizations use for receiving crypto gifts, as an added service. Not sure how widely it's been adopted.
    Best,
    John Smilde

    Director of Development Operations | Cato Institute

    1000 Massachusetts Avenue NW, Washington, DC 20001

    jsmilde@cato.org

    202.216.1451






  • 13.  RE: Chariot DAF Portal (SSN requirement)

    Posted 03-03-2026 11:09 AM

    Hi all,

    We use ScaleFunder (RNL) for our crowdfunding projects and recently met with our rep to discuss Chariot's DAFpay integration. While the functionality for our donors to use the DAFpay lookup feature is worthwhile (and free), he was pushing the Chariot Giving account to "process" the donations through Chariot's banking partner, Column N.A., for a 2.9% fee. 

    Unless I'm missing something, I don't see the benefit of paying a fee when DAFs can send the grant to us directly. We recently received a check from Chariot Giving for a company matching gift donation, with no fee - we didn't establish a Chariot account for this.

    Best,



    ------------------------------
    Jeannie Patch
    Salem State University
    jpatch@salemstate.edu
    ------------------------------

    Original Message


  • 14.  RE: Chariot DAF Portal (SSN requirement)

    Posted 03-04-2026 08:39 AM
    Hi All,

    I just want to thank everyone for the great responses.  This obviously hit a nerve.  We might not be able to fully control vendor requirements, but our awareness of industry-wide opinion is invaluable to us all.  You're the best!

    Jim

    Jim Holzbach

    Senior Director for Advancement Resources

    Alumni Relations & Development, Trinity University

    jholzbac@trinity.edu / 210-999-8079

    Register for Alumni Weekend 2025 at gotu.us/alumniweekend  




    Original Message


  • 15.  RE: Chariot DAF Portal (SSN requirement)

    Posted 03-04-2026 09:53 AM

    Hi James, UNE received our first Chariot Giving check back in December.  It was given on behalf of Groundswell Foundation.  We did not have to provide any information to Chariot and it did not appear they charged us a fee.  Due in part to some vendors charging a fee for checks and checks getting lost in the mail, I've been moving to EFT for any vendor that will allow it.  Some, like Fidelity ask for a SS#, but not all do.  I just set up EFT with Frontstream and they asked for copy of the license of a control person.  When I'm asked for an SS# and our EIN doesn't cut it, I provide the SS# of our CFO.  (with his permission!)    



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    Michael Manning
    University of New England
    Mmanning6@une.edu
    ------------------------------



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