This article will address frequently asked questions about Gifting. If you need a detailed guide on how creators can gift membership to fans, please visit our guide to Gifting membership to your fans.
Planning a seasonal push? Check out “Finally, the perfect gift” on Patreon for Creators for tips on making the most of gifting. Currently, Patreon for Creators is only available in English.
- If you do not wish for fans to be able to gift your membership to other fans, you can turn off the option in your Promotions tab under Gifted by others. Just select the Settings icon and toggle off the Enable gifts by fans option.
- Yes. Creators can send gifted memberships directly to their fans. These gifts work the same way as fan-to-fan gifts and can be redeemed by new, free, existing, or members who have cancelled their membership.
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Anyone logged into a Patreon account, both creators and fans, can purchase gifts. Guest checkout is not available at this time.
Note that only fans who have indicated they are 18 years or older can purchase a gift from 18+ creators.
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New, free, existing, and cancelled members can redeem gifts.
Existing members can now redeem gifted memberships without canceling their current pledges. This applies when the gift is for the same or a higher tier than their current one. Their billing cycle will continue uninterrupted, and gifted access will apply automatically once redeemed.
You can only have one gifted membership per tier at a time. If you try to redeem a second gift for the same creator, regardless of tier, you'll receive an error message. You can either wait for the current gift to expire or cancel it in Membership Settings.
Fans can gift other fans (Fan2Fan), or creators can gift memberships directly to their audience (Creator2Fan).
Only members aged 18 and older can redeem gifts for 18+ creators.
Please note: merchandise rewards are not earned through gifted memberships. Only memberships with an attached payment to the member account are currently eligible to earn Patreon merchandise rewards. This rule also applies to regular merchandise items: a member will not begin earning merchandise rewards until their account makes its own payment.
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You’ll now find the gifting option in more visible places across Patreon:
- Through banners on creator pages
- Through the overflow menu on posts
You will receive earnings from a gift purchased by a fan immediately. You do not have to wait for the gift to be redeemed.
- Gifts must be redeemed within 90 days or they will expire and will not be automatically refunded. The gift purchaser will need to reach out to you to request a refund, which you can grant at your discretion. You will still receive funds from gifts that are not redeemed.
- Yes. You can select how many gifts you want to buy in the checkout. To do so, they can edit the ‘How many gifts do you want to purchase?’ number up to 100 gifts after selecting a tier. Once they’ve completed checkout, the gift link can be redeemed up to the number of gifts they’ve purchased.
- Gifts must be redeemed by a recipient within 90 days of purchase. Gifts that aren’t redeemed within this window will no longer be redeemable and will not be automatically refunded. If the gift purchaser would like a refund, they’ll need to reach out to you directly. You can grant a refund at your discretion by visiting your Sales tab.
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You can initiate a refund for gift purchases by accessing your Sales tab, where all gift sales are shown. Just click on the gift you’d like to refund, and select Issue Refund from the side panel. You can refund charges within 90 days of the processing date.
For gifts purchased through the iOS app, fans can also request refunds through Apple via reportaproblem.apple.com. Apple will handle the refund on your behalf and communicate with the customer on the status of the refund. If the refund is granted, funds will be issued back to the customer's Apple account.
- No, any existing sales and discount codes will not apply to the gift price. If you offer annual memberships, gifts of 1 year of membership will be at the discounted annual membership price.
- Yes. You can select how many gifts you want to buy in the checkout. To do so, they can edit the ‘How many gifts do you want to purchase?’ number up to 100 gifts after selecting a tier. Once they’ve completed checkout, the gift link can be redeemed up to the number of gifts they’ve purchased.
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When the gift period ends, the gifted member will lose access to the membership unless they choose to stay on as a paid member.
To help them seamlessly continue to have access to their paid benefits, we send a reminder email and notification 3 days before their gift expires. This message includes the option to add a payment method to convert their gift into a paid membership. They won’t be charged until after the gift period ends.
- If a member upgrades or downgrades a membership during the gifted period, the gifted membership will be canceled immediately. The new membership tier will take effect, and they will be billed accordingly. Please ensure they understand the implications of any changes to their membership during this time.
- No, you cannot limit then number of gifts purchased by fans. However, you can turn off the option in your Promotions tab under Gifted by others. Just select the Settings icon and toggle off the Enable gifts by fans option.
- No, blocked members cannot redeem gifts.
- Gifted tiers are taxed the same way that regular tiers are taxed. These rates will vary depending on how the tier is set up, and where the member is located. For more details on how sales tax works on Patreon, please visit this article.