I want to donate to a charity where the money will go entirely to the person in need (e.g. cancer)

[LettuceBeFree]

I want to donate to a charity where the money will go almost entirely to the person in need - I'm especially wanting to donate to a cancer research, cancer care, etc. type charity.

My concern is that a lot of charities seem to use the donations they receive to line the pockets of millionaire senior management staff, CEOs etc. with only a small fraction actually going to those in need. I want to avoid "charities" like that.

Please let me know of some genuine charities (esp for cancer) that you know for sure don't do this.

And there's a MacMillan cancer support advert on my page already (not that I have anything against them).

Even with charities mainly staffed by volunteers there are generally some wages and overheads to pay. Paying for websites, advertising, leaflets etc etc etc.

One way to maximise a particular person receiving money e.g. something like giving a cancer patient £50 to help pay expenses for travel to hospital, food etc would be to volunteer yourself, get to know people with the illness and put money in an envelope with their name on it and send it to them.

If you want money to go into research that is a very expensive and time consuming thing to do. Often the research staff have to work in the field as donating one day out of a life of doing another job every so often gives no consistency in research. How can you grow something in the lab and not come back to it until your next day in next month, it needs looking at and acting on sooner. You can't rely on everyone else to look at your research, they'd have to know what you were doing when and take time out of their one or two days a month volunteering to check your stuff.

So they need staff and money to pay wages, so they need staff to raise money. So they need to pay those fundraisers, so they need to pay people to fund fundraisers, so ultimately they need to pay CEOs to organise those staff and to be the face of these charities. The CEOs etc can and do bring in big money as well, they know the people with big money.

I, as a volunteer, don't necessarily know the owners of multi-million pound corporations, but the people who run big charities and businesses are more likely to know millionaires. A lot of the people at the top of these charities can be big fundraisers, so don't be too quick to not be willing to help fund their wages, they are needed too.

(And no, I am a sahm not a CEO of a charity, so I am not asking you to pay my wage.)

If you want to be of direct help...volunteer.

I used to work in the charity world. Ask for the annual review - it will give you a break down of how they deal with money.

Your local hospice though is probably best based on your description. Most are between 85-92% going to direct patient care. Remember that staff will be paid but to get great staff, you have to pay them.

Our ceo at a hospice earned a lot of money but she took the charity from raising 1 million pounds to 6 million in 5 years, opening another centre, opening two more outreach stations, increasing the number of people who could be helped.

Charities have to release their annual review legally and it is an important document that will give you case studies, aims of the organisation, facts and figures that will help you decide.

I avoid the big ones like macmillian, nicknamed the cancer of the charity world for their shitty behaviour to their staff and other charities, as well as how much their money will be spent on marketing and high ups. Avoid the scouts main organisation - support your local troop directly and state money must go to only that local group.

Shelter was good last time I checked. Tree foundation is also good.

How about looking for a small local charity?
I have recently been diagnosed with breast cancer and have been looking at local organisations that offer help.
Some provide counselling, others help with hair loss.

I was in hospital last week for surgery and there was a fan on my bedside table. It was sheer utter bliss and I commented on it to a nurse. She said the NHS doesn't run to fans but that someone had donated a fan for every bed on the breast ward. I am very grateful to that person for making my stay in hospital so much more comfortable.

I work for a charity. The amount spent on operations is a tiny percentage, under 10%. It really is a fallacy to think charities are using the money for wages in this way but you can check every charity’s financial reports on the Charity Commission website before donating. The third sector is not well paid - I have halved my annual income with this role.

I wholeheartedly recommend watching this when considering whether people working for charities should be paid well for the work that they do:

Dan Pallotta: The way we think about charity is dead wrong
go.ted.com/5-p7pQ

How is it ok for bankers, business owners, the CEO of Amazon etc to earn a high wage for what they do, but we reject the idea of people who are trying to make a difference -to make our society better - to do the same? Shouldn't we as a society be rewarding and encouraging this?

Would we say that the NHS shouldn't be given money for its "overheads" when those overheads are surgical tools & hospital beds? Would we want our surgeons to earn pennies for saving our life? Charity staff salaries and charity overheads are all part of the cause. We need good leaders to run effective charities.

Do we worry about what the CEO of Tetley's salary is when we make our morning cup of tea? Do we think about this when we buy something off Amazon or open a bank account?

If we don't invest in charity staff then the brightest and the best will get a job elsewhere. Charities doing amazing work will cease to be. Don't we want our charities to be full of bright, clever people who have the financial resources to make a real difference? Don't we want out kids to aspire to work for a charity and not to have to choose between this and paying the bills? Do we want the people striving to make our world a better place to be struggle to feed their families?

I work for a charity and honestly, no one is in this to get rich. I could leave the sector to have better job security and a higher wage elsewhere - but I enjoy what I do and that's the trade off. In the charity world we never know if we'll have enough funding from one year to the next. It's not what the papers make it out to be.

Dan Pallotta: The way we think about charity is dead wrong
go.ted.com/5-p7pQ

Learn more about watching TED Talks on all of your favorite platforms: www.ted.com/about/programs-initiatives/ted-talks/ways-to-get-ted-talks

I wholeheartedly recommend watching this when considering whether people working for charities should be paid well for the work that they do

I'll try that the next time I try to get a pay rise at work :)

There aren’t my charities like the ones you describe. Buy yourself something nice with your £10 a month instead, I’m sure cancer research U.K. won’t be crying in their cornflakes over it

Hi lettuce I have sent you a PM with details of a specific case if you wanted to help in any way possible. I forgot to send the mother’s email address but it is on the bottom of the news article xx