Friends not sponsoring dh

I am fascinated by people who think it's okay to hit up their mates for contributions to theirs or their kids' causes numerous times, received the donation, but don't feel in any way obliged, not even the slightest degree of twinge, to do the same when the shoe is on the other foot.

@Primmyhill it could be the case that there have been so many circulated in your group of friends over the years there is fatigue? And maybe you are in the unfortunate position of being people's line in the sand, so to speak, that it's got to stop somewhere.

I found friends more giving than family when we were raising funds for a charity. Our local shops also put collection tins in and another 2 local businesses donated upwards of £300 each. We are a small community and the mindset generally is we support those who support us. I support many small businesses with custom and sharing their pages etc. In return they were happy to sponsor us and share our just giving page etc ☺️

Might be worthwhile speaking to your local shops etc?

For what it’s worth, we never done anything fantastic. We done the Kilt Walk however, we had additional challenges such as carting medical equipment etc with us and some pre teens ☺️

This does not feel like it's about a charitable endeavour - the comments around "I supported them so they should support me" and if they don't support you then you shouldn't support them - not sure I understand this - it's meant to be supporting a charity not supporting egos, it's quite a distasteful business to behave in such a way.

You can't force people to donate just because you do. He should have thought about that before he spent money on whatever the event is - he could have just donated that money and done some fundraising on the side if the cause was really the main motivation.

There's also the aspect whether somebody actually agrees with the charity/donation request - this can apply to anything, for example

Medical research/testing on animals
Military/help for heroes
Captain Tom's daughter's swimming pool fund
Animal welfare
Oxfam and their appalling record of male staff behaviour
Church or faith based appeals
Gaza/Palestinian support
RSPCA head office vs local branches
Various LGBTQIAA++ organisations
Voluntourism that takes opportunities for locals to get paid work in favour of privileged Brits paying for the trip
Ecological damage caused by trips or activities

Etc, etc, etc.

Sometimes it's easier to ignore than to tell somebody that hell would freeze over before you'd give a particular charity money or that

Ok, that's interesting. Why is this?

Is it because asking to give to a charity is for the charity, and asking for sponsorship is for the person? If not, what's the difference?

If someone asked for sponsorship for MND and you just said "I'll send them £1000 directly, but I won't mention your name", would you expect that person to be pleased or irritated?

That is a completely different matter, don't conflate asking for sponsorship to asking people to donate directly to a charity.

Up to them whether they want to donate or not. Other people's challenges mean nothing to me. Sometimes I will donate if I really care about the charity, but other than that, nah.

Yes I agree. We've had to ask family for sponsership for various fundraising activities school have asked them to do. I've always been so grateful for their support (it has got to the stage that we now just donate what we think everyone would have ourselves - but thats another story)! When our son wanted to do his own challenge our family friends and neighbours were so generous and donated over £500 and I am still blown away by their generous support. I do make it a habit of supporting their endevours probably even more than I might have if their support hadn't meant so much to us. It is a shame OP and YNBU to be disappointed but what can you do?!. Incidentally I also think you've taken the results of your poll well so ignore those that suggest otherwise. I would add that the more tedious yearly school fundraisers I've only ever gone to family for but the one biggy we posted on various social media as we were pretty impressed by him ourselves.

I think you’ve probably got the idea from the opinions of the majority 😂 but the fact that you won’t say what the event is means that you know it’s wanky/ not impressive. Nice to do something for charity, and for an affected friend. But doesn’t mean that begging from all your friends is appropriate

Wow. Lots of arseholery targetting you OP! Good luck to your DH and don't sponsor any of the twats who don't reciprocate.

Stop sponsoring others and don’t expect sponsorship- everyone hates it.

What about someone who gives absolutely every spare penny of their income to a particular cause and asks others to donate to that cause as well, because they genuinely believe it's hugely important? Should they stop asking because they are not going to able to give to other causes if anyone asks? Should we look at it as transactional interactions between individuals, or look at the end result and whether it's a good one?

Ì agree. Don't bother sponsoring them in future op

Yes

I used to run a Guide pack in an affluent area
The Commissioner organised slots bag packing in Tesco
I refused to do it
The parents could well afford the subs and I wasn’t giving up even more of my free time

@Itisbetter

"For me it is like clapping at them learning to ride a bike, or saying well done in your GCSEs, or listening to a long Ernest explanation about recycling. Dh is an adult he doesn’t need that. I appreciate you see it as something different but to me it’s like you saying “you played hide and seek with my child so I should play tennis with your partner next week”. One is part of supporting young humans to adulthood and the other is just what I choose to do with my time."

You are completely missing the point.

If your friend was doing a sponsored event which really mattered to them and they had taken time to care about what you and your children were doing, even sponsored your children are you absolutely saying you wouldn't sponsor your friend and would think that was reasonable even though you knew it mattered to your friend?

I used to work for a very large organisation and got sick of the constant pressure to sponsor people. I do tend to sponsor children however. The other point to bear in mind is that, while I'm sure this charity is above board and legitimate - charities per se can have a bad rap now - some are run by virtual con artists.

We have one charity that we now support monthly - so feel we do our bit.

OP, I think you are finding that unless you have a group of friends who all regularly give to everyone, sending out emails with the info is not the best way to do this. My experience with fundraising is it works better if you talk to everyone individually, ideally in a social setting, explain why it's important to you and your DH and ask if they could spare ((insert sum here)). The charity probably has some factsheets for fundraisers with suggestions.

For me it is like clapping at them learning to ride a bike, or saying well done in your GCSEs, or listening to a long Ernest explanation about recycling. Dh is an adult he doesn’t need that. I appreciate you see it as something different but to me it’s like you saying “you played hide and seek with my child so I should play tennis with your partner next week”. One is part of supporting young humans to adulthood and the other is just what I choose to do with my time.

Your friends have probably forgotten who has donated to their many charity events as they blur into one after a while. I would be disappointed none of given so far but not because I have given to them. If it is the marathon - I have about half a dozen friends doing it this year - who knows your husband might not be the only one doing the same event.

@Itisbetter

"I see it as a gift to the child of my encouragement, not a debt for their parents to repay later. In the same way I often give birthday or Christmas presents to children I see around those dates but not adults. I also would probably pay for a child to go on a ride or give them a penny to throw in a wishing well and would be amazed if their parent expected to do the same for my husband. (And he would be confused)."

You're doing something nice for the child of a friend or receive it for your child. If when the other party does something that matters to them, you ignore it that is absolutely unreasonable. Otherwise you're only valuing what matters to a child and not respecting your friend. It's absolutely not the same as paying to go on a ride. It's about acknowledging the importance of something to someone who is supposed to matter to you.

I see it as a gift to the child of my encouragement, not a debt for their parents to repay later. In the same way I often give birthday or Christmas presents to children I see around those dates but not adults. I also would probably pay for a child to go on a ride or give them a penny to throw in a wishing well and would be amazed if their parent expected to do the same for my husband. (And he would be confused).

I would say don't give up yet. It's only just March. In February April felt like ages away and it's the kind of thing I'd think 'oh I'll do that's but wouldn't necessarily do it right away as there's still plenty of time.

Does he have a WhatsApp group he can put it round? If he's just sharing on FB loads of people won't even have seen it.

Failing that make him a donation tin to take in the office. He could do it as a 'with a month to go before x I've brought in...' lots of people prefer just to drop change in than go through links.

I'm not pushy but I think with sponsorship you have to be.