British red cross wasting money!

Ronaldo_Mconaldo

I'm always getting letters through the post from the NSPCC going on about something or other after I sent them a donation back in March. Just sick of it, waste of paper, money and time. Might have had something to do with the cheque for £1.28 bouncing but there we go.

hollydays

The problem is, all charities that are reasonably big have departments that are being pressurized to meet targets by their managers.

olias

I have worked for a reasonably small regional charity. They had a reasonably small management team, but still managed to ammass between them, a top of the range Jaguar, a Saab convertible, a top of the range Mercedes, an Audi TT, and a BMW M3, all paid for by the charity and all had correspondingly large salaries. Meanwhile the workers (of which I unfortunately was one) were paid minimum wage and worked in a shipping container in a car park and were expected to work overtime for free because 'its a chariddee.....'
Most charities these days are just big fat cat corporate businesses in all but name and just happen to have charitable status. An awful lot of them are providing services that should be the responsibilty of the government to fund.

Olias

zagfles

hollydays wrote: »

The problem is, all charities that are reasonably big have departments that are being pressurized to meet targets by their managers.

Yes, like cold calling it's annoying for most people but because it works for some they persist. Even the govt seem to recommend it see https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/203286/BIT_Charitable_Giving_Paper.pdf

I had some RSPCA chuggers round recently - they claimed they wanted 50p per month!! Yeah right - no charity would make any money from getting chuggers to sign people up at 50p a month - after they'd paid the chuggers and cost of collection/admin etc even 10 years worth of donations wouldn't cover their costs. £60 would probably be less than the chugger company's fees alone!

What they really want is for you to sign up as a donor so they can bombard you with junk mail & phone calls to get you to up your contribution. Like with the CSA - far easier to get those already paying to pay more than to get those paying nothing to pay something.

carlislelass

We donate to a charity through a dd, lately we`re getting phone calls asking to "upgrade"the amount. next time they will be told we will cancel unless the calls stop

redmike123

I did some pension work at a well know charity fairly recently , I was pretty angry at how little respect the managers showed to their front line care staff, how the care staff themselves were on minimum wage or zero hour contracts, and how well the management staff got paid.

This just isn't right and this, and the fear of being bombarded with e mails, letters and calls if I do contribute, has caused me to stop giving.

Although my wife and I recently gave a couple of hundred to the Phillipines relief work, through paypal, so they couldn't sell our details on.

janiebquick

As a matter of principle, I refuse to donate money to any charity that sends me freebies. I think I get so many direct mailshots as I am signed up to the Telephone Preference Service - and I only signed up to them after some highly aggressive phone calls from charities!

Think about this any charity looking at these boards. You are alienating a lot of people who would like to donate but are being put off by unacceptable marketing techniques.

zagfles

redmike123 wrote: »

I did some pension work at a well know charity fairly recently , I was pretty angry at how little respect the managers showed to their front line care staff, how the care staff themselves were on minimum wage or zero hour contracts, and how well the management staff got paid.

This just isn't right and this, and the fear of being bombarded with e mails, letters and calls if I do contribute, has caused me to stop giving.

Although my wife and I recently gave a couple of hundred to the Phillipines relief work, through paypal, so they couldn't sell our details on.

The trouble is that if you want to gift-aid the donation you have to give the charity your name and address. Charities which don't provide an easy opt-out for junk mail will put people off using gift aid, or put them off donating at all.

VickyA_2

janiebquick wrote: »

As a matter of principle, I refuse to donate money to any charity that sends me freebies. I think I get so many direct mailshots as I am signed up to the Telephone Preference Service - and I only signed up to them after some highly aggressive phone calls from charities!

Think about this any charity looking at these boards. You are alienating a lot of people who would like to donate but are being put off by unacceptable marketing techniques.

An elderly uncle was bombarded by requests (read "demands") for donations from various charities. When he died, it was discovered that he'd been donating £500 per month in total. Entirely up to him how he spent his money, but he admitted when he was alive that he couldn't say no.

ailey

I'm currently collecting my charity requests on the run up to Christmas and, since the start of last week, I have 8 different charity envelopes. Pity the birds don't eat paper as they would be well fed lol!

I do give a monthly amount by Standing Order to our local hospice. They run a Hospice Lottery and it costs £4 a month but I don't mind this as they have built a lovely new building for supporting people and their families when patients have cancer or other life limiting illnesses so the money is put to good use. They are generally self funding like most, if not all, other hospices and there is always local fundraising taking place for them.

A couple of years ago I was working in the garden and a girl stopped to speak wearing a MacMillan Nurses tabard. She wanted me to sign up to £15 per month and I explained that I couldn't afford that but I would contribute something so suggested £5 a month. She tried so hard to get me to change it to £15 and I had to be very firm as we are both retired so she eventually let me sign up for £5 per month. I was annoyed at her attitude about the amount, although she was very pleasant and convincing, that I wished afterwards that I had told her I wouldn't be signing but I feel the MacMillan Nurses do such a good job. After a period of time I received a phone call from the charity and the man on the other end was trying to get me to up my amount but I just explained to him that we were both retired and that I would not be increasing my amount. A bit annoying when that happens but £5 a month should be better than nothing. If I ever get another call asking me to up my payment, I think I will just cancel but until that time I'll pay the fiver.