Help! Best way to collect from colleagues for a leaving present?

[Tequilamockinbird]

I've somehow been nominated to start a collection for a much loved manager who is leaving the company soon.

We are mostly homeworkers though, and are spread across the country.

What is the best way to do this? PayPal? Or is there a crowdfunding site that I could do this on? Never used crowdfunding before so not sure if we'd be charged for that.

Any ideas?

not crowdfunding, they take a huge cut.

paypal takes a bit but less.

don't go too nuts though, the card is the important thing - get them all to post you a signed note to stick in it.

I did think we'd be charged for crowdfunding.

There's quite a few people who want to contribute - if they send via friends and family via PayPal would we get around being charged?

I'm going to ask for an email from each person that I can print out and stick in a huge card.

Why not just bank transfer?

I'd rather it was kept separate from my bank account so that I can keep track of how much there is etc. my bank account is very busy with work expenses in and out at the best of times, and I could do without extra confusion really.

Our team is similar to yours and we always use PayPal, I'm not sure if they take a charge though? It seems to work well for us though.