If donors send donations via PayPal, can their email addresses be automatically captured into a nonprofit’s database?

Asked Jun 11, 2013· 1 answer
Faisal KhanAnswered Jun 11, 2013
You can do this with something called the Instant Payment Notification (which is free, you just have to turn it on). See https://www.paypal.com/ipn for more information.

There are several companies that provide scripts to add to database:

  • PayPal IPN Plug-in Script: http://bakery.cakephp.org/articl...
  • Code Examples for IPN as provided by PayPal (you need to understand programming for this): https://www.paypal.com/us/cgi-bi...
  • Donations Tracker (includes database addition): http://www.stellarwebsolutions.c...
  • WordPress PayPal Donations Plugin with IPN + Database: http://wordpress.org/extend/plug...
  • Same plugin as above - official site: http://www.nonprofitcms.org/2010...
  • PayPal IPN Listener - https://cms.paypal.com/us/cgi-bi...
  • You can try contacting these folks and see if they will allow or code a database option for you - http://www.phpjabbers.com/paypal...
  • Here is another script - it will push the buyer's information into the database - http://www.micahcarrick.com/php-... - you can have a coder write a script so that it can query the DB and export the list out as a CSV file or a text file. Do look at this page for the flow diagram of how the IPN works: http://www.micahcarrick.com/payp...

Essentially any decent coder ought to be able to help you work with your IPN and put the Buyer's information in a database for you to work on.
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