Bit difficult to explain but I'll ramble on. I support a couple of animal charities by direct debit, only small amounts but I think it helps. Anyway, got a letter from one asking if I would like to up my monthly donation of £8. Thing is I only pay them £7.50, and I think it was £7 to start with. This came with a letter with a couple of stickers saying yes I would like to continue to support ******. You put the sticker on and send the letter back, assuming you dont notice that the figure is higher. I'm getting a feeling its an underhand way of getting you to give more money without actually realising it. Just sent them an E mail stating I seriously considering cancelling the direct debit.
Its a very vexed subject with so many of these charities paying their top staff lots of money. In the past we have given to those that have helped us like the local Hospice and Childrens Hospital where you can readily follow how the money is spent. However as that recent TV program about Stars doing charity work showed, think things have gone way too far the other way, so much of the donated money goes to the wrong people or even the wrong cause. The Governments Foreign Aid budget of £13 Billion seems the worst example of waste. As for your donations, why not ask for details of their yearly accounts so you can see if its actually spent as you would hope on the animals actual health and care rather than "admistration" etc. before deciding if its better placed elsewhere.
Maddening! DD is an easy way to collect and it's also easy to sneakily rely on people forgetting, or just clicking OK. Once the tap from your bank account to theirs is open, it's hard to control. Obviously it's a shame as DD really is so much more cost effective way to collect donations than anything else. I strictly do not do charity via direct debit as it's too easy to lose control of whatever DDs one has already. Instead, I do one off- donations, often to celebrate something, or as a present for likeminded people. (My sister who loves sailing was very impressed with "her" yellow wellies for the North East volunteer coastguards ) Unfortunately most door to door collectors don't even have visiting cards or leaflets to give so that I could do a one-off donation if I wanted to. Their causes are usually worthy and I would take the 5 minutes and a tenner to support if I remembered what the charity was actually called, but their only means now is to ask you to fill in a sheet with all your personal data to allow one more DD to be set up. That's a no go for me.
I do donate to a few charities by direct debit and by and large get few requests to increase the donation. I have increased the amount to one over the years, but never in response to a request and never over the phone; I always do it through there website. Curiously I do not pay my council tax by direct debit, because I consider them to be a bunch of spendthrift wastrels who shouldn't be allowed access to anybody's bank account not even their own.
This is a difficult subject. We're quite particular about which charities we donate to and make sure that they don't spend the money unnecessarily. We never give to begging letters - even the charities that we support. Most of the charities we have told not to send us begging letters or we may stop supporting them. The one for whom we open our garden is a local one where a lot of the work is done by volunteers but the fundraising now needs to be done by professionals. They just get a salary. The nurses are, of course, paid. A few of the other charities we pay an annual sum by direct debit such as the RNLI (Lifeboats). Those donations are done by DD and under the Gift Aid scheme, which means that the taxman adds another 25% to it. All the proceeds from the sale of one of my books go to Mountain Rescue. Other charities we support are either local or fundraised for by people we know. Some of them are overseas but are ones we have been to. Three of them are orphanages - each of different religions. It's what they do that we support and not who they are.
I tend to find that charities find DD the best way to collect money and I dont mind that as long as they keep to their side of the bargain. Maybe it should be done by standing order? I would perhaps give a bit more, but I dont like them trying to do it underhand, if they do I'll stop the whole thing. I just wonder how many other people they are doing it to who are not that likely to notice.
We would not do by DD. Know someone who kept being asked to up their donation .. a cancer charity in the UK I believe so they cancelled DD. We give to Algarve's Cat Charity and the local Bombeiros (Volunteer Firemen) a couple of times a year. My Will gives everything to Charity should I survive T'other Half as does his.
I only usually do things like council tax etc. that I have to pay, via D/D. People like the AA or car insurance etc. I don't as they always hike up their payments without you supposed to be noticing. Didn't expect a charity to be doing it though.
I dont mind being "asked" to up my donation, I can always refuse. In this case it is being assumed and they are trying to trick me into upping, without noticing what they have done. Just put a sticker on the letter saying I give them my continuing support, yeah. But I'm not supposed to notice they have put on the letter a higher amount, and I must reply by the end of March.
I don't think Charities should "pressure" you to pay more by sending mail asking you to up your direct debit and you have to watch that they don't, in fact, take your agreement as already agreed and up your DD without asking. After finding out the salaries of some of the CEO's of nationally known charities, which are in the £150,000 to £300,000, then I decided to be very selective and support, in main, local charities. Now that most of the Charities employ Market Companies we have become regarded as walking Cash Machines rather than individuals contributing to their charity. My Wife died of Motor Neurone disease and so, when I shuffle off my mortal coil and shake hands with the Devil, a third of my estate will go to the Motor Neuron Disease Association.
I look for none profit charities, I don't do big charities that admin fees are more than what goes to the people that need it
I retired early many years ago, but look out for bargains at car boots and jumble sales that will earn a Charity much, much more than I've paid for them. I also grow stuff for charity plant sales.
Like Scrungee, all our donations are linked with Gift Aid (as I mentioned in my previous post) and the taxman adds another 25% to the donation. A word of warning about Gift Aid:- If you don't pay tax you should not agree to do it through Gift Aid. The 25% that the taxman gives is taken from the tax you have already paid (it's linked to your NI number). If you don't pay tax the taxman will still give the charity the 25% but will send you a bill for it. I don't pay income tax because my pension isn't high enough but I used to pay tax on my savings. As they have now put a limit on tax on interest I now don't pay tax on that either. So our Gift Aid is done through Mrs Shiney who pays tax on the pension from where she worked. So don't get caught out. Most people pay tax so it's not a problem but if you're on a State Pension (and no other income) or on Benefits then you shouldn't agree to Gift Aid. The State Pension is below the Personal Allowance level.
As Mrs Scrungee doesn't pay tax (as she doesn't work!) and I get my tax allowance increased via Marriage Tax Allowance, I have to be careful I don't give too much to the charity where I'm registered for gift aid, but there's plenty of others. Will have to review if Universal Basis Salary is introduced as an emergency measure.
I give to a local hospice who do a lottery thing, as I know the sterling work they do and the services they offer. Others are by appointment only
