Give item to charity shop or sell and give proceeds? 3 November 2014 at 11:16PM in Charities 7 replies 2.2K views

xxdeebeexx

Hi Mum has just started to clear out some of my dad's possessions (he died 2 years ago)
She wants to donate a set of classical cassette tapes to the charity shop.

I have just looked on Ebay and the exact same set has recently sold for £100.
Is it better to sell the tapes and donate the money or just let the charity shop do their work?


How reliable is the selling on Ebay for charity does anyone know?


tia


dx

Casati

Sell them and donate the proceeds. Unless you have a specialist music charity shop near you with staff who really know their onions. None of the charity shops near me asell cassettes at all anymore, most just simply don't have the time to do an internet search on every item that's donated.

Selling on ebay for charity works well in my experience.

asajj

Hi, depending on the charity, some have their own teams to sell valuable things on Ebay (Oxfam has it, Cancer Research has it etc.)

Or you can try to sell on Ebay yourself. I did before. You list the item and state you will sell for the charity. They will ask you to choose. Then you can choose a percentage for the donation. You can donate the all proceeds or half of it - up to you.

When you sell for charity, a special icon displays on your listing and tells it is a charity listing.

So for the answer on your question - it is reliable from personal experience.

You still need to sort posting etc.

Is there any specific charity you want to donate? If not, I'd say take them to Oxfam as they are good at that sort of stuff.

xxdeebeexx

Thank you.
I think that mum just wants to get rid of the clutter. She would rather the money/goods went to the British Heart Foundation or cancer Research.
I will see what she thinks when she's finally ready to let them go.


Thanks Casati I think I will see if there is a specialist music charity shop near by as that would be the easiest option for me.


Mum wants to clear the tape set a bit at a time I think it would be better to keep all the cassettes together - there are 65 in all- what do you think?


dx

asajj

Selling them seperately on Ebay will be easier in my opinion.
Posting 65 casettes is problematics first of all.

For instance if there is a set of books / dvds/ casettes, there could be ones that I dont want, need. I rather to buy single.

You can of course give option to merge posting. So if someone buys 5 of them from you, you can post them together. It is only fair anyway.

You can put this on your listing so they will know.

You can also ask people to contact you if they are interested in to buy all and perhaps collect locally. Easier and you will get cash from hand and won't pay Paypal fees.

Most charities have Twitter accounts. If you have one, you may ask them what they think. They might help.

xxdeebeexx

asajj wrote: »

Selling them seperately on Ebay will be easier in my opinion.
Posting 65 casettes is problematics first of all.

For instance if there is a set of books / dvds/ casettes, there could be ones that I dont want, need. I rather to buy single.

You can of course give option to merge posting. So if someone buys 5 of them from you, you can post them together. It is only fair anyway.

You can put this on your listing so they will know.

You can also ask people to contact you if they are interested in to buy all and perhaps collect locally. Easier and you will get cash from hand and won't pay Paypal fees.

Most charities have Twitter accounts. If you have one, you may ask them what they think. They might help.

Thanks, the value was/is in the complete set which is rare to find along with the tape stands .
We have since popped them into the charity shop and told the staff about their value and that they might raise £100+ as a set or 20p-30p individually.
It's now up to them.


dx

trukdiver

xxdeebeexx wrote: »

Thanks, the value was/is in the complete set which is rare to find along with the tape stands .
We have since popped them into the charity shop and told the staff about their value and that they might raise £100+ as a set or 20p-30p individually.
It's now up to them.


dx

When I worked for a charity shop, I used to get annoyed by the cheap prices they put on stuff that I knew would go for a lot more on eBay. Charity shops usually only have a local market whereas eBay has the whole country. Also, the helpers are often ignorant of the value, even when people come in saying something may be valuable.

[Deleted User]

However you end up selling everything, don't forget to Gift Aid it (if you're a UK tax payer). That adds another 20% to your donation