You have probably been there: a sales call that lasts forty minutes before anyone mentions a number, a quote that turns out to depend on how many people are on your membership roll, a feature you assumed was included that sits behind a separate charge. By the time you have worked out what a platform actually costs your congregation, you have already spent hours you did not have — and the contract is waiting for a signature.

The Treasurer flags it at the next meeting: between the church management software, the giving platform, the website host and the email tool, the subscriptions have quietly become one of the largest fixed costs on the books. This guide looks at what Daviah's structure does to reduce that unpredictability, and is plain about where it does not go far enough.

You can look at everything before you enter a card number

Signing up asks for a name, an email address and a password. No card, no phone number, no domain name. From that point the free plan lets your church build and save its entire website and view it through a private link. Nothing on the free plan expires. The site waits, unpublished, until the day you decide to make it public.

That means you can build out your site, see how the editor works and judge whether the platform suits the way your congregation's office runs — all before any money changes hands. The free plan is a build environment with no clock on it.

The prices, plainly stated

The Website plan is $29.99 a month, or $300 a year — about $25 a month, saving $59.88 against monthly. It publishes your site with its own editor, contact forms, events, news and galleries, and hosting.

The Website and Members plan is $79.99 a month, or $819.99 a year — about $68 a month, saving $139.89 against monthly. It adds the office behind the site: congregation records, giving, meetings, minutes, messaging, the member portal and a custom domain connected for you.

Both prices are the same whatever the size of your congregation. The price does not change because your membership roll grew or because you started a new Ministry.

Month to month, with no contract to sign

Both paid plans run month to month. There is no annual contract required to start and no lock-in period during which you are committed regardless of what changes. If your circumstances shift — a building project, a pastoral transition, a lean giving season — you are not tied to a spend you agreed to under different conditions.

Paying yearly costs less than paying monthly, so if your budget is stable and you want to reduce the annual figure, that option is there. It is a choice, not a requirement.

What happens when a payment fails

If a subscription payment does not go through — a card expires, a bank declines a charge — nothing is withheld for the first ten days, and the office sends three reminder emails before anything stops. That window gives your Treasurer time to update a card or sort out a banking issue without a crisis.

If the subscription does lapse, your congregation records stay readable. The CSV exports for members, giving records, payments and officers continue to work. The full site and office come back as soon as the subscription is renewed. Nothing is held back to force a decision under pressure.

What this guide cannot tell you

It would be dishonest to leave this out. The pain many church administrators describe goes further than unpredictable pricing alone: running several separate subscriptions — a giving platform here, a website host there, an email tool somewhere else — adds up to a figure that is genuinely large. This guide cannot claim that Daviah replaces all of those tools, and it does not.

Per-feature charges, where individual capabilities cost extra on top of a base plan, are not addressed by the facts available to this guide. Whether Daviah replaces tools your church currently pays for separately is something only you can judge once you have worked through the free plan.

What this guide can say is that you can see the full cost before you commit — no sales call, no quote that depends on your roll size, and no card asked for until you choose to publish.

Questions

Does the price go up as our Congregation grows?

No. Both paid plans are priced per organisation, not per member. Whether your Congregation has forty people or four hundred, the monthly or yearly figure is the same.

Can we look at the platform without giving a card number?

Yes. Signing up asks only for a name, an email address and a password — no card, no phone number, no domain. The free plan lets you build and save your whole site, preview it through a private link and take as long as you need. Nothing expires.

What happens to our Congregation records if we stop paying?

They stay readable. The CSV exports for your Congregation members, giving records, payments and officers all continue to work even if the subscription lapses. The full site and office come back as soon as the subscription is renewed.

Is there a contract we have to sign?

No. Both paid plans run month to month. You can pay yearly to reduce the cost, but there is no lock-in period either way.

What if our card payment fails one month?

Nothing is withheld for the first ten days after a failed payment, and the office sends three reminder emails during that window. That gives your Treasurer time to sort out a banking issue without the church losing access to its records.

Does Daviah replace all the subscriptions our church currently pays for?

This guide cannot make that claim. What tools Daviah replaces depends entirely on what your church currently runs and what you need. The free plan lets you work through that question before spending anything.

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