Jumpstarter is happy to announce that with immediate effect, project backers with credit balances exceeding R250, may request a payout of their credits.
To cover back charges that applied when the pledge was made and for the payout, a handling fee of 5% will be subtracted from the balance upon payout. Backers opting to retain their funds as Jumpstarter credits, may still pledge the full amount to other projects of their choosing.
This policy change does not affect Jumpstarter’s all-or-nothing funding principle. Projects are still required to meet their funding goals before they are paid out. If they fail to reach the funding goal, their pledges are returned to the backers in the form of Jumpstarter credits. What changes as of today, is that backers with lots of credits may now get it back into their own banks.
Today’s policy change was inspired by our ongoing quest to grow into the best crowdfunding platform we can be. In the past, potentially large backers of commercial and product-oriented projects had been reluctant to channel their product purchases through Jumpstarter because their money would be locked up in Jumpstarter if the projects they backed does not reach funding goals.
The result was significant inertia in the take-up of commercial projects. We’re confident that the changes will have a predominately positive impact and be received as such.