Charity card scam?

Cressers

Yesterday an unsolicited pack of eight X**s cards from the mouth and foot painters' charity dropped through my letter box. They wanted me to send £6 by return post for them!

I object both to inertia selling and moral blackmail. The cards await collection if they want them back, otherwise I'll keep them. Does anyone know any more about this charity? If they can afford to mass-mail greetings cards then they can't be that in need of donations!

Stewie Griffin

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Associatio ... _the_World

Controversies
The AMFPA has in later years been the subject of several exposés in German, French, Swiss, Swedish, Norwegian, British, Canadian and Danish media, suggesting unethical behaviour within the organization. The coverage has spurred criticism from charity, consumer and handicap organizations. The criticism includes:

That AMFPA effectively poses as a charity organization although it is purely a commercial venture, in effect conning charitable people out of money..[1][2][3] [4]
That only a fraction of the surplus is paid out to the handicapped artists, since only 94 (2008) of them are fully employed by the company, which in turn allegedly turns a world wide profit in the hundreds of millions US$. [4][5][6]The precise world wide profit is confidential.
That high salaries, favourable loans and property lease contracts are given to AMFPAs long-time legal adviser Herbert Batliner, his friends and family and other lawyers employed at the AMFPA. [1][3][4][6] Recently retired Batliner is himself a controversy, being previously accused of money laundering for Colombian drug barons and for his alleged involvement in the 1999 German CDU contribution scandal.[7][8]
That funds are being diverted to unknown parties via a network of "mailbox" companies. [5][6]
The use of high pressure sales tactics by sending its main sales item, Christmas card packages to consumers via unsolicited direct mail with an option to pay afterwards.[3]
The secrecy maintained by the company.
No claims have been made suggesting any illegal activity by AMFPA. The criticism has been centered on what is perceived as bad ethics.

[edit] AMFPAs responds to the criticism
The AMFPA has in some news reports and court hearings responded to some of the claims, stating that AMFPA has never intentionally presented itself as a charitable organization, but instead has explicitly pointed its commercial nature out to consumers. AMFPA has also stated that 80% of the world wide profits are distributed among the artist. AMFPA declined to present financial records to support this claim. [9]

[edit] Litigation
In June 2007 the company sued Danish Broadcasting Corporation and Danish daily Ekstra Bladet for libel after negative coverage during December 2005. On October 10 2008 the High Court of Eastern Denmark ruled in favor of the accused journalists, stating that there was sufficient factual basis for statements like: "Behind the scenes we found a well-oiled money making machine with economic puppeteers, who are scraping in money with arms and legs", "People think they are supporting a charity, but in reality we are looking at a money making machine" and "...only a measly 3% is going to the mouth and foot painting artists". AMFPA is presently appealing the decision to the Supreme Court.[10]

Shysters it seems.

Mister W

I'm a charitable person but I think that's even worse than those idiots who accost you in the high street in your lunch hour trying to persuade you to donate £10 a month to whatever charity they're working for.

If you put something through my letterbox then don't expect to get it back so I'd say thank you to the charity and add them to my supply of Christmas cards

deptfordmarmoset

Yay, they've been doing that for what must be 2 decades now. Because I don't like the style of art, I never use them and because I neither asked for them nor like the ''moral blackmail'' aspect, they simply go in the recycling bin. Though if there were only 8, they must have recently scaled back on the numbers they send - there always seemed like there were hundreds in there.

deptfordmarmoset

Good work, Stewie, you've just spared me the usual momentary twinge of guilt as the cards hit the bin...

Stewie Griffin

deptfordmarmoset wrote:

Good work, Stewie, you've just spared me the usual momentary twinge of guilt as the cards hit the bin...

Thank the FSM that everything on Wiki is true then

Buckled_Rims

Unfortunately, I've stopped given to charity for the past 5 years. There's far too many scams. Even "good" charities have had bad press regarding how much they have in reserves..ie RSPCA refusing to release funds of £10's millions.

Maybe that's why the number of "professional" criminals have doubled in the UK in the last 10 years....They're now Charity fundraisers

Mister W

So because there are a few scams you're not giving any money to charity? That's pretty tight. What about the small local charities? The ones who run the local animal shelter or soup kitchen?