Help Topics/Events & Registrations/Attendee Types and Cost

Attendee Types and Cost

While most church events are free to attend, some events may involve a cost of entry or a cover charge.

An Attendee Type is a designation you can create and customize for who will attend your church event. For instance, if you are hosting a dinner, you can create an attendee type for “Adult” and another for “Child”. Creating different types allows you to know the makeup of your attendees, as well as set a unique price for each.

Adding Attendee Types and Cost

Select the “Add a New Attendee Type” button. In the new fields, enter a designation for your attendees and a cost for their registration. You can create as many different types and costs as you need.

Add Attendee Types for your church event in the church calendar in Churchtrac

When people fill out the form to register, they will select one of these options from a dropdown menu where they will also see the associated cost. If you do not create an attendee type, or if only one type is created, the registrant will not be prompted to select an attendee type. This field is only visible when two or more attendee types are created.

Event Payment Type

There are four options for determining if and how to receive payment from registrants: Don't Ask For Payment, Flexible Payment, Payment Required, and Ask For Donation.

Online Giving needs to be configured on your ChurchTrac account in order to accept payments and donations for registrations. Learn more about Setting Up Online Giving ›

Payment Types for your church event in the church calendar in Churchtrac

 

 

Do Not Ask for Payment

This is the default option and is used for events for which you will not require payment. You can still create different attendee types, however. This can be used for events where you need to know certain details about who is attending. For instance, you can create attendee types for Male & Female, or Parent & Child, or Husband & Wife, etc.

Flexible Payment

This allows registrants to choose to either pay to register now or later. It is up to you to determine when they have to pay if they choose to pay later.

A Church Connect user will see their unpaid balance displayed on their “Upcoming Events” screen in their account.

Payment Required

This option prevents someone from completing the form until they have entered their payment information.

Ask for a Donation

This allows people to choose how much they want to donate. Even though it is a "donation" option, you must choose a maximum amount of donation, as well as a suggested attendee donation when setting up the event.

You should indicate to your participants that a payment is certainly not required. To bypass a donation select the "Pay Later" button. To make a donation select "Pay Now" to pay the suggested amount or edit the amount.


All forms of payment can be made using a credit card; Please note that ACH is not available for registrations.

Additional Settings

Additional details for your church event in the church calendar in Churchtrac

Max Amount/Cost per Registration

This creates a limit on how much a given family or group can be charged for an event.

For instance, for a family event, you can determine how much you will charge for each adult and child, yet cap how much a whole family will have to spend to register. This will prevent costs from becoming prohibitive for large families.

Select a Payment Category

Choosing an option in the dropdown menu allows you to designate which income Category the money will be applied to at your church.

The General Category is the default. If you want to designate another category, make sure you have your Categories already set up prior to receiving registrations for the event.

Attendee Types and Cost FAQs

No. Registration payments cannot be refunded directly inside ChurchTrac. Refunds must be processed through your Stripe account.  

 
 

Within ChurchTrac, you can view and manage a registrant’s information and payment status from the event’s "View Registrants" area, but canceling or adjusting a registration will not automatically issue a refund.

 

There is currently no built-in notification that automatically alerts you when someone cancels or modifies a paid registration.

Because of this, you may need to either:

  • Rely on the registrant contacting your church directly, or
  • Periodically review your registrant list for updates as the event approaches

You can still track changes in your Registrant Report, where cancellations will be reflected in the Status column as “Cancelled.”

 
 
 

Refund timing is not controlled by ChurchTrac, since all payments and refunds are handled through Stripe. Once a refund is issued in Stripe, it typically takes several business days for the funds to appear back in the customer’s account, depending on their bank or card issuer.

If a refund cannot be processed through Stripe, your church may also choose to issue a manual refund, such as a check, if needed.

If someone has already registered for an event, we typically recommend creating a new event with the correct registration method. You can make the new event identical to the original in every other way, then manually register anyone who had already signed up. If the event includes paid registrations, we recommend reaching out to our Support Team for assistance before making any changes.