"Hey, you look like a decent person, you wouldn't refuse to help (orphans, AIDS victims, the blind... etc)"
Usually young and energetic, and dressed in a bright uniform, with a clipboard full of forms ready to take your bank details.
Now, I've worked for charities AND I've worked for banks, and I would not give someone a form that contained all my banking details AND my signature. The potential for fraud is too high.
One Chugger tried to reassure me by saying there's the same info on a cheque. Well, that's why I don't have a cheque book.
I ask them to give me the form so I can set it up myself. Nope. I figure they're working on commission. Well, if they care more about their commission than the people they're supposed to be helping, they can take their fake 'buddy smile' somewhere else. I'll donate without their 'help'.
I have no problem donating money to charity. I'm not wealthy, but I'm better off than some unfortunate in Haiti, Sudan or a refugee camp in Thailand. But when I give money to charity, that's where I want it to go. Not 30% of the top to pay some smiley youngster to bother me on the street, before it even gets into the other overheads.
Charities would be better off hiring some of these same people to go around to big employers pitching a system where employees can donate directly from their wages. It has two immediate advantages over dealing with Chuggers.
- No need to give a stranger your bank details
- Tax can be adjusted straight away
I once did this in a former job, and CONCERN for example, were getting 3,000 /month straight from payroll, and the employees got the tax deduction straight away instead of applying at the end of the year.
It would take time to set up, but more of the money will get to the Charity.
And then we could wander down Cruises Street again in relative safety.
"Charities would be better off hiring some of these same people to go around to big employers pitching a system where employees can donate directly from their wages."
ReplyDeleteYou'd have thought so, and believe me, they've tried it. I remember promoting payroll giving in company canteens for Oxfam around 1989. Payroll giving is a fabulous method of giving: tax-efficient, regular gifts, and people tended to keep giving for years.
Great idea. Problem is, despite the best efforts of charities and professional agencies that do the pitching on behalf of groups of charities (yes, some charities have outsourced that activity too), payroll giving still accounts for a tiny proportion of overall voluntary income. It doesn't help that many companies still do not offer the facility to their employees.
Many charities and their fundraising staff are not daft. They focus on the methods of fundraising that are most cost-effective, based on years of data and experience.
It might seem logical that the best use of their time and money is in different fundraising methods, but if they're not using them, chances are they've got a sound commercial case for not doing so.
Howard Lake
UK Fundraising
www.fundraising.co.uk