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by vzqx 1466 days ago
This is how Patreon already works - they pool both incoming and outgoing donations for the month into a single transaction to reduce fees. But there are a bunch of donors who only donate $1-$3 a month to a single creator, and these incoming transactions don't benefit from pooling.
3 comments

This is how Patreon works when you're lucky.

They keep degrading the pooling and/or threatening to remove it entirely.

You pool the transactions over a longer period. The donor initially gets charged $10, but if they cancel early they will get refunded. Then after a few months they get charged another $10 and so on.

It has drawbacks, like if the person doesn’t have $10 or they complain that they’re being charged. But a) is unlikely since most people who are that poor aren’t donating money, and b) is hopefully unlikely if you make it very clear how the payment system works and that they can get refunded if they cancel early.

I guess the next step would be to have a monthly minimum of $10 or more. You could still split it as 10 $1 donations but at least fees would be reasonable.
I suspect patreon's hope is you onboard people with one small monthly payment, then that person will over time add more which lets them then make a useful profit on you.