Fee transparency
Where your money goes
What a donation costs, what reaches the organisation, and who bears each charge. The arithmetic is below, not a summary of it.
This document is a draft
It states the platform's intended position and has not yet been reviewed by a lawyer. Contact details and response commitments are not final. It is published now so the terms of the product are visible before it takes real money, not because it is settled.
Three charges sit between what you give and what an organisation receives: what the payment gateway takes, what Ujala Hope takes to run verification and payouts, and GST on both. None of them is hidden, and none of them reduces the amount on your 80G receipt.
The rates in force today
| Charge | Rate | Borne by |
|---|---|---|
| Payment gateway | Near zero on UPI, about 2% on cards. Actual, never modelled. | The organisation |
| Ujala Hope platform fee | 10% of the gross donation | The organisation |
| GST | 18% on each fee above | The organisation |
| Anything charged to the donor | Nothing. You pay the amount you chose. | — |
Fee schedule version demo-v1, in force since 1/1/2026. An organisation accepts a specific version when it signs its agreement; a rate change means a new version, a notice period and re-acceptance, never a silent edit.
A worked ₹1,000 donation
Gateway pricing in India is per-instrument, so the same donation costs different amounts depending on how it is paid. Both cases are shown rather than a blended average, because a blend matches neither.
Paid by UPI
- You give
- ₹1,000.00
- Gateway fee
- −₹0.00
- GST on gateway fee
- −₹0.00
- Platform fee
- −₹100.00
- GST on platform fee
- −₹18.00
- Reaches the organisation
- ₹882.00
- Certified on your 80G receipt
- ₹1,000.00
Paid by card
- You give
- ₹1,000.00
- Gateway fee
- −₹20.00
- GST on gateway fee
- −₹3.60
- Platform fee
- −₹100.00
- GST on platform fee
- −₹18.00
- Reaches the organisation
- ₹858.40
- Certified on your 80G receipt
- ₹1,000.00
Gateway figures here are the per-instrument estimate. The payout an organisation actually receives uses the fee the gateway really charged, taken from the settlement report — see below.
Your receipt is for the full amount
If you give ₹1,000, your 80G certificate certifies ₹1,000. Gateway and platform fees are the organisation's cost of fundraising, not a reduction of your donation. This is a compliance position, not a presentation choice.
Gateway fees are actual, never a modelled percentage
Indian gateway pricing is per-instrument and per-transaction: UPI is near zero, cards are around 2%, netbanking is often a flat charge. A single blended percentage would not equal what the gateway actually deducted on any transaction.
Deducting a modelled 2% when the gateway charged nothing would mean quietly keeping about 2.36% of every UPI donation — money the organisation was promised. So an organisation sees a clearly-labelled estimate when it previews a withdrawal, and the actual settled fee in the payout itself. A donation cannot become payout-eligible before it has settled, precisely because until then the real fee is unknown.
What the platform fee pays for
- Document verification of every organisation before it can raise anything
- Checking that the payout bank account belongs to the verified organisation
- Holding funds for a defined period before payout, so a fraudulent campaign can still be refunded
- Issuing 80G receipts and filing the annual statement
- Running the grievance channel and acting on what it receives
What we do not do
- No paid placement. No organisation can buy a higher position in the directory. The ordering rule is published.
- No optional tip on top. You are never asked to add a contribution to the platform at checkout.
- No charge to the donor. The amount you enter is the amount you pay.