Charity Giving Adverts at Christmas

Alan_Breck

Alan_Breck

Well-known member
There are many great causes and charity giving is something I do regularly, mainly associated with the homeless, Crises at Christmas, Centre Point, Salvation Army et al. There are lots of different charities asking for donations on TV all through the year but I think there are even more in this run-up to Christmas. When giving we assume that all our donations go to the needy but if you investigate the charities employees and their salaries, this can't be so. Some large charity CEOs are are on £300k pa, then there are other officers on the payroll and admin staff which are obviously a requirement. It would be interesting to know how much of my £ giving finds it's way into the needy community.

#UTB
 
Alan_Breck said:
There are many great causes and charity giving is something I do regularly, mainly associated with the homeless, Crises at Christmas, Centre Point, Salvation Army et al. There are lots of different charities asking for donations on TV all through the year but I think there are even more in this run-up to Christmas. When giving we assume that all our donations go to the needy but if you investigate the charities employees and their salaries, this can't be so. Some large charity CEOs are are on £300k pa, then there are other officers on the payroll and admin staff which are obviously a requirement. It would be interesting to know how much of my £ giving finds it's way into the needy community.

#UTB
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don't they legally have to declare the % that goes to actual "charity" . i'm sure it is in the company accounts or somewhere on the websites in small print
 
I stopped donating via a lottery to a charity after I read half their outgoings were on staff costs.
 
Mr_Fridge said:
I stopped donating via a lottery to a charity after I read half their outgoings were on staff costs.
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That's the conundrum, isn't it? If we stop giving then the needy won't get a penny. Penalising the "fat cats" means penalising the needy too. I find it a difficult, but still give, even knowing the facts.

#UTB
 
Alan_Breck said:
That's the conundrum, isn't it? If we stop giving then the needy won't get a penny. Penalising the "fat cats" means penalising the needy too. I find it a difficult, but still give, even knowing the facts.

#UTB
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I can definitely see that point of view. but 50% was too high for me in this specific instance, and in fairness to charities generally, higher than the majority of others.
 
Alan_Breck said:
That's the conundrum, isn't it? If we stop giving then the needy won't get a penny. Penalising the "fat cats" means penalising the needy too. I find it a difficult, but still give, even knowing the facts.

#UTB
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If the Chief Exec increases the income to the Charity by more than his salary, and continues to do so, does it actually matter what he's paid ? - despite the cynical "fat cat" comment, most Execs are paid what they are because they're improving a business' performance

Any before anyone jumps down my throat, I did say "most" Execs
 
Malaguena said:
If the Chief Exec increases the income to the Charity by more than his salary, and continues to do so, does it actually matter what he's paid ? - despite the cynical "fat cat" comment, most Execs are paid what they are because they're improving a business' performance

Any before anyone jumps down my throat, I did say "most" Execs
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The charitable sector is a very competitive industry, and so they need to recruit capable and experienced individuals as they're competing for every £ with hundreds of other charities, and so simply having someone who is willing to do the job cheap isn't really an option if you want to actually make a difference.

Having done some pro-bono work I was amazed by the passion, drive and commitment that people within the particular charity I worked in brought to work every day, irrespective of the salaries they were getting (and many could have earned more in the private sector without a doubt).
 
I tend to donate to school directly for books etc through a governor I know, its actually in Middlesbrough . A friend does the North Run Every Year so I sponsor him too. The BHF, the Air Ambulance - in tins on the bar of the local club on matchday. I always buy a poppy. Local stuff I will be giving to a dogs charity.

These big national Charities used to send people to our works and you could choose from about 25 different charities with an attachment to you wages monthly. The girl who arrived was in the best BMW on the market at the time. I used to give to Save the Children

The headlines were about Oxfam recently, it seems to have collected enough over the years to pave Africa in gold, but all the pedo stuff has put me off giving to Oxfam or any large organisation now.
I think the lack of correspondence and results is probably hurting them too.

When I was younger I used set up 5-side football tournament every year for over 5 years, and with a lot of help from work colleagues and around 15 other companies (suppliers). We would have a drink, a bit of a buffet, blind cards, raffles, and a donation to the charity of their choice £50 a team.
At the end of the summer we would have an evening do all invited presentation and disco.
It grew to be a good annual event until we closed.
 
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The most valuable thing you can donate is your time. You can see then that what you are giving is going directly where you want it.

Easier said than done though. I find it far easier to donate money than my time which I already feel is scarce.

It's a weird one though because nobody begrudges giving money to a business in exchange for a good or service even when the vast majority of the money you give goes to paying staff or shareholders but people think Public Sector, charities and not for profits should be different. If you want something run well then you have to hire competent people and running a large organisation is a skill most people don't have and the ones that do have the opportunity of earning more money elsewhere if you don't pay appropriately.

I have also worked within a charity, processing payments for a charity within a hospital, and a lot of the things it was funding made me question whether the people that had donated would be happy with that being why they donated. There were things like flights and hotels to Italy for a consultant to go to a conference. It is badged as improving the service by increasing knowledge etc but the flights nd hotels were a far higher standard and cost than they would have got approved through the regular channels which to me isn't in the spirit of accepting charitable funds. If surgeons on £200k+ want to be upgrading their flights/hotels that should come out of their own pocket.

We've also seen the news about Captain Tom's family and their misappropriation of funds. It makes it difficult to trust charities which is why giving your time or giving directly to those that you want to help is different.

I also look very sceptically upon anyone who tries to raise funds for charity by doing something that costs the majority of the money that gets raised. If you want a holiday to Tanzania to climb Kilimanjaro then do it. It's pointless raising £10k if it's going to cost you £8k. It's not for charity at that point, it's just justifying a holiday.
 
If you pay the CEO of a charity (whose turnover is £X00m and has X,000 employees) £50k a year because its 'for charity' then you'll probably find the efficiency of the organisation reflects that salary, and the needy get even less of it.

If you want any organisation to perform well, you have to pay the market rate, whether its public, private or charity sector.
 
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Marvanelli said:
And there we go. 9 posts it took for someone to mention Tories.

Thought it would've been less to be honest.
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If you don't like people mentioning the tories then I would suggest that you refrain from mentioning them yourself.

See, you have now created this post which mentions tories so we have three posts mentioning tories instead of one post mentioning tories.
 
Marvanelli said:
And there we go. 9 posts it took for someone to mention Tories.

Thought it would've been less to be honest
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I think its always been relevant don't you think?, more so since the Conservatives have been in power. These times have been difficult for a lot of people. Foodbanks started in the 2000`s that helped the homeless especially through Churches, now it helps full time working people who cant make ends meet. I don't know why I'm doing this as your normally very aware of matters. The speed of life happens to even Uni grads and professionals in big cities.
 
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Marvanelli said:
That wouldn't stop people mentioning them though.

Nearly every thread on here is littered with Tories/Labour tosh....it's quite boring now.
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Come on Marv, there's 4 political threads on a page of 50, most are football related. I know its tough to be a Tory just now and you know why.
 
Nano said:
I also look very sceptically upon anyone who tries to raise funds for charity by doing something that costs the majority of the money that gets raised. If you want a holiday to Tanzania to climb Kilimanjaro then do it. It's pointless raising £10k if it's going to cost you £8k. It's not for charity at that point, it's just justifying a holiday.
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But most people wouldn't take the £8k out of the donations, so the charity is still £10k better off in your example.
 
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