charities

bianchimoon

just read that the CE of Halo landmine clearing charity has had all his kids private school fee's 70k a year paid for by the charity, and recently that the CE of the Bluye Cross animal paid off another exec from charity funds to the tune of £60k after he had an alleged affair with her girlfriend. Now i'm cynical at the best of times and still donate to certain charities but seems like the regulation of charities is a total mess and the goodwill of the public abused by people who probably start off with the best intentions but I guess, same old story power, money, corruption or at best innapropriate use of donated money. There shold be a register of all charities showing what percentage actually goes to the 'cause'

rolf_f

I think the thing is that charities are businesses like any other - ie their primary interest is to make money in some form or other. They depend on the altruism of others but it doesn't mean they have to be altruistic themselves. So they employ the same sort of people to head them up as other businesses and employ the same sort of tactics to their best ends. Apparently Oxfam are rather good with their lawyers - they'll fight tooth and nail over a poorly worded will even if it is clear that what they are trying to achieve was not what the deceased was intending.

bianchimoon

agreed, there has to be business costs, tho a simple system that tells public what percentage actually goes to the cause would work for the public. I think the 'big' charities would in the main fight any legislation that would force them to do it. You never know food fat/sugar labeling was fought against but is now becoming accepted. Even a simple traffic light
(green) = 80% goes to cause
(amber) = 50 - 80%
(red) less than 50%

pblakeney

bianchimoon wrote:

agreed, there has to be business costs, tho a simple system that tells public what percentage actually goes to the cause would work for the public. I think the 'big' charities would in the main fight any legislation that would force them to do it. You never know food fat/sugar labeling was fought against but is now becoming accepted. Even a simple traffic light
(green) = 80% goes to cause
(amber) = 50 - 80%
(red) less than 50%

As a general rule of thumb, a listed company aims to make 5-10% for it's shareholders.
By definition, then it takes 90-95% to run the company.

Even given that most charities are donated their stock, I think your figures are optimistic at best.

A representative of one charity which I was unfamiliar with knocked on our door looking for donations. After a bit of research which took several hours, I ascertained that less than 20% went on the actual cause. Few can afford to spend that amount of time to do such research, and I certainly won't again, but that is what the so called charities rely on.

I now only contribute to certain charities from personal exposure and local charities where you can see the benefits.

bianchimoon

a bit of research shows
http://www.smallcharitydirectory.co.uk/ ... to-charity
that the figures are far better than you suggest PB, unless i've misread or am being mislead?

pblakeney

bianchimoon wrote:

a bit of research shows
http://www.smallcharitydirectory.co.uk/ ... to-charity
that the figures are far better than you suggest PB, unless i've misread or am being mislead?

The example I gave was for illustrative purposes only, and possibly a poor example of a poor charity.
The information that I gleaned took hours and was not readily available with a couple of Google clicks.

As much as I would like to believe the figures quoted in the above link, the cynic in me says that given the source, they may be susceptible to creative accounting. I am sure that a Starbucks accountant could do wonders for a charity.

crescent

I think many of the major charities are run like a business and you could argue that they have to be to do their work efficiently and optimise fundraising, allocation of monies etc. I have a personal experience of Cancer Research that did leave a nasty taste in my mouth though and made me very cynical towards this idea. My father died from cancer 10 years ago. One of my parents' neighbours made a donation to CR in his memory which meant that a sympathy card arrived from CR with the name of the person making the donation, in whose memory it was made, etc etc. A nice idea, and much appreciated by the family. However, in the same envelope as the card was a letter from Cancer Research, wording was along the lines of "We are sorry to hear of your loss of a loved one from cancer, perhaps you would like to make a donation to help us fight this terrible disease etc". I think we can all agree that it is a deserving charity, touches most peoples' lives at some point or another and any funds that can be raised are a positive thing but it just felt wrong to have a begging letter in with the sympathy card, certainly very upsetting for my mother.

bianchimoon

Crescent wrote:

I think many of the major charities are run like a business and you could argue that they have to be to do their work efficiently and optimise fundraising, allocation of monies etc. I have a personal experience of Cancer Research that did leave a nasty taste in my mouth though and made me very cynical towards this idea. My father died from cancer 10 years ago. One of my parents' neighbours made a donation to CR in his memory which meant that a sympathy card arrived from CR with the name of the person making the donation, in whose memory it was made, etc etc. A nice idea, and much appreciated by the family. However, in the same envelope as the card was a letter from Cancer Research, wording was along the lines of "We are sorry to hear of your loss of a loved one from cancer, perhaps you would like to make a donation to help us fight this terrible disease etc". I think we can all agree that it is a deserving charity, touches most peoples' lives at some point or another and any funds that can be raised are a positive thing but it just felt wrong to have a begging letter in with the sympathy card, certainly very upsetting for my mother.

marketing gone mad, sorry about your loss

Pross

I prefer to donate to small, local charities where there are minimal staff on sensible wages and the donations are gratefully received. A colleague of mine used to do a gig each year for a local charity which got absorbed by a bigger charity. They did their gig as usual and donated all the money they made. Instead of the usual letter thanking them they got a call off someone saying they had sent the money to the wrong part of the charity!

I would say there is also a huge amount of duplication of charities meaning they are competing with each other rather than concentrating on doing what is best for their cause.

mamba80

Why are private schools given charitable status? anyone know ?

Havin done work for Oxfam in Oxford, I would never in a million years give them a cent, their offices were opulent to say the very least.

Pross

mamba80 wrote:

Why are private schools given charitable status? anyone know ?.

Because the laws are made by their past pupils.