Organization language defaults
Go to Organization Settings and find the Receipt Language section:
- Primary language — English (en) or French Canadian (fr-CA).
- Secondary language (optional) — None (default) or whichever of English/French isn’t chosen as primary.
These defaults pre-select the receipt language when you set up a run: a primary with no secondary picks that language, and a primary plus a secondary picks bilingual. For a bilingual run, your primary language is also the language of the delivery email for any donor whose own language is blank.
Receipt language for the run
The receipt PDF’s language is a single choice for the whole run, made when you set up the project — English, French, or bilingual — not a per-donor choice. The built-in Canada CRA-ready PDF templates ship in all three variants, and every receipt generated in that run uses the same one (choose bilingual if your donors are a mix of English and French speakers). See PDF Templates for the four Canada templates these variants apply to.
Per-donor language from your import (optional)
A language column is optional. Without one, every donor’s delivery email is in the run’s language: English for an English run, French for a French run, and your organization’s primary language for a bilingual run.
Add a language column when donors on a bilingual run need emails in different
languages. A column headed Language, Donor Language, Preferred Language,
or Langue du donateur maps automatically; any other heading can be mapped by
hand (see Field Mapping). Free-form values are
recognized — for example EN, FR, English, French, français,
Bilingual, bilingue, and combined forms like EN+FR or
Bilingual EN-FR. A blank cell falls back as described above.
A donor’s language must be one the run’s receipt is printed in. A French donor on an English-only run would receive an English receipt, so field mapping warns about those rows and receipt generation is blocked until you change the donor’s language or set the run up as bilingual. A value that isn’t recognized is flagged as a warning but doesn’t block; that donor is treated as blank.
Delivery email language
Email templates carry a language of English or Canadian French — there is no separate bilingual email variant. Each donor’s email uses the first language of their resolved language: their own import value when set, otherwise the run’s language as described above. See Email Templates for creating and managing template language variants.
Number and date formats
Amounts and dates on the receipt PDF follow the template variant’s language, not necessarily the donor’s raw import value:
| Template variant | Amount | Date |
|---|---|---|
| English | $1,234.56 | Jan 5, 2026 |
| French (fr-CA) | 1 234,56 $ | 5 janv. 2026 |
| Bilingual | $1,234.56 | 2026-01-05 (ISO) |
Bilingual templates keep English-style amount formatting but use an ISO date so the single date field reads unambiguously in both languages.
The app in French
Separately from receipt language, the Tax Receipt Generator interface itself — navigation, forms, settings, dashboards — is available in English or French. Use the Language control (globe icon) to switch; the choice is saved to your profile and applies every time you sign in. This only changes what you see in the app — it has no effect on the language of receipts or delivery emails sent to donors.
Related
- PDF Templates — the Canada CRA templates these language variants apply to
- Email Templates — managing per-language email variants
- Field Mapping — mapping a language column from your import