personal experience of good and bad charities to support please

[60andsomething]

If you have been on the receiving end, please give a bit of information about which charities you think money should go to, and why, if you can, and also, which charities are not full filling their aims, in your opinion, and money should not got to

Thank you

I support WaterAid and the Samaritans.

Are these good choices for my hard earned scraps? Are there better choices?

Thank you

The way they turned a blind eye to any bullying against non-salvationists was really poor, and common too. As well as mistreatment of those who were salvationists but not from popular families.

I also agree re their management of money. The amounts they spent on buying houses for officers to live in was obscene too. I used to think they were great but I will never give them a penny ever.

Chaldon animal
Sanctuary -

http://chaldonanimalsanctuary.co.uk/donate.html

Woodfield animal sanctuary - https://woodfieldanimalsanctuary.org

Ty Nant cat sanctuary -
https://tynantcatsanctuary.org

Greyhound Rescue Wales - https://greyhoundrescuewales.co.uk

JR Whippet rescue - https://whippetrescue.org.uk

Doberman Rescue - https://www.dobermann-rescue.org.uk

Pug Rescue -

https://bubblebecca.co.uk

Malinois rescue - https://www.newdawnmalinoisrescue.co.uk

Gower Bird hospital - https://www.gowerbirdhospital.org.uk

Change a paw life rescue - https://m.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100072531337792&name=xhpntfbactionopenn_user

We have the monthly membership direct debit to the National Trust, but I must be honest, we only really do it to get free entry to their houses and gardens - not out of any charitable aims.

That's so wonderful to hear @InTheShallowTheShalalalalalalalow

I trust that you are in a good place now. 💐

I'm always suspicious of appeals for UNICEF too. I'm not saying they don't do good work, but the UN is basically all of the governments of the world joining together - why are they so desperate for £3 a month from me?

I agree that you can't really go wrong in supporting your local hospice - they do such amazing, largely unsung work and don't waste obscene amounts of money on vanity projects, politicising or snouts in the trough.

Bloody hell.

Sadly, I've heard stories of hoarding money then spending on investments then waiting , before money is then handed over whilst profits are kept then re invested.

Maybe that's the large charity model but something is a bit off.
A huge , national charity was recently accused of this .

Smaller, less prominent charities get our money. Ones that simply cannot afford an advert every fifteen minutes , throughout the day, every single day.

I look at how much the chief executive earns, (quite often more than £100K!) and then how many of their executive staff are on over £70K or 80K

I stopped giving to SPANA the donkey charity overseas because I felt the whole executive team were earning silly money while they want us to give £2 a month so a donkey in Morocco can get some medicine.

🙄

I saw the light. Charities are a big business, I understand that, but sometimes there is a piss take.

Same an the RNLI with all their life-saving volunteers that work for free in unbearable oceanic conditions, while the top brass earn an absolute fortune.

@TheSmallAssassin @AliciaCared

Thank you for bringing Acts 435 to my attention.

@penjil this is a common argument that CEOs of large charities get paid too much mobey. However, they’re usually paid the going rate for a business or organisation that size.

Charities I give to - our local children's hospice, local refuge, hygiene bank

A charity I'll never give to again - another vote for The Salvation Army. I was sexually abused as a child attending the church by a much older person teaching me music, and it was fairly common knowledge that there was something not right. Of course, the corps officers went on to be promoted later 🙄

Nobody ever informed my parents or the police. I've seen some of the paperwork regarding this and the victim blaming (for the way I dressed etc) is off the scale terrible. I was made to apologise to my abuser for 'making allegations that could ruin a good man's reputation' when I felt forced into saying it wasn't true because an adult there said he would go to prison and I would be taken away from my parents and possibly be in trouble with the law.

Following on from what others have said, it is insular and culty and if you come from a non-SA family you'll always be somewhat on the outside. There are some amazing people who truly work for good in the organisation but there's some real evil under the surface too.

I give to Shelter and have done for years. Used to give to the Samaritans a lot over the years but have stopped now and won’t give again due to personal experience.

I do understand that, and appreciate that side of the argument.

But it seems so hypocritical when they have a bleeding jeart ethos and "every penny goes towards...fill in the blank".

It gives people the attitude of "Well, if they were so concerned about it, why have 10 or more executives earning over £80,000 and usually the top two or three earning over £100,000 then?"

It is just galling.

You could use 1% of their salaries to fund a water pump in 200 villages or more. Or save 200 donkeys or more from going lame, and stop guilt tripping the public who are squeezed like lemons as it is.

Incidentally, the RNLI have so much cash in the bank, they can afford to run the whole charity on interest alone. When I heard that, I stopped giving to them.

I’m so sorry that happened to you. The abuse alone was terrible but the behaviour that followed was disgraceful. At the same time, I’m not at all surprised and I suspect the officer in question was probably from an Army family, as those are the ones they are protective over.

I hope you’re doing ok.

Thank you ♥️ just to clarify, the abuser wasn't a corps officer. He was from a prominent local Army family though. The officers around at the time were absolutely worse than useless though - this guy pursued their older teenage daughter and she warned me off him. You'd think after that they would have kept him away from the kids, but instead they made him youth leader 🙄

Anyway, not to hijack the thread too much but this is the reason I can no longer support them and would advise others to give their money elsewhere.

Twas ever thus.

My dad had nothing but bad words to say about them.
He was born in the twenties. ( Me, the sixties.)
He thought the very worst of them, as did my PILs ( born in 30s.)

I'm not convinced of their rescue package that they offer to the homeless.

@EvenLess I'm so sorry. 😞

I’m so glad others have admitted the Salvation Army comes across whiffy.

They’re proud to ‘look after their own’. That means big family house, big pension scheme, lengthy hols and not much work if you’re a member (Salvationist).

If you’re not, you get the work and that’s it. They rely hugely on unpaid workers/volunteers. On such a large
scale it must be legally dodgy, but hey, it’s a church so it can’t be.

It’s very cult-y, and the ones I’ve met over a decade were very pleased with themselves. When they turned up at work.

If you donate, they do tell you to check out the homeless help and the find-a-person service they’re famous for on the website. They don’t tell you the Government already paid for that in full, and the work’s allotted to volunteers they don’t pay.

Our local SA does so little in this great capital no one noticed when it shut for two years. Even now the doors only open to sell the donations they’re given. Or to sell a Nescafé to the vulnerable for 50p - or £3 if you want to bring crafting stuff.

They do one church service a week and charge megabucks for funerals. Strangely no one chooses it for a wedding.

£3 for a Nescafé.

@EvenLess I’m so, so sorry. I only wish I was surprised. All the very best to you and hope you manage to thrive despite this appalling institution fail.

I personally don't give to the NSPCC. They spend a lot of money schmoozing celebrities and on swanky events.
Their helpline is pretty hopeless they just pass everything on to police or social services, don't actually get involved themselves.
I'd rather give to local charities. I give to my local air ambulance.

Mencap - the only charity who offered any help for youngsters like our DD - who is now an adult - with SLD, severe ASD and a life threatening form of epilepsy.

Epileptic Association and similar plus the Autism charities were totally disinterested.

Mencap used to arrange various activities in conjunction with a small, now defunct local organisation of which my DH was a director. Our dd's trust fund is via the Mencap subsidiary too. We would have been lost without them with regards to setting up the trust fund and the follow up services. Very low fees and independently governed and serviced too.

I also support a small amount regularly to the British Legion.

I don't think they're broadly comparable, though. The CEO of a huge actual business is ultimately responsible for whether they sink or swim with their profits - those profits coming from offering goods or services that people can (except in the case of monopolies e.g. your regional water board) freely choose whether they want or not. All of those profits have to come after everybody involved in working to earn them has been remunerated with at least national minimum wage.

Nobody is paying Tesco a single penny because they want to altruistically support them or promote their aims; if what they sell and the prices they charge are ever not acceptable, then people will instantly desert them. Nobody is leaving a legacy to Tesco in their will. No CEO of Tesco can proudly boast of how much free (volunteer) labour they've managed to secure/maintain to enable them to generate their income. Shake a bucket in the High Street in aid of Tesco for a whole day and it will go home at dusk as light and silent as it was at dawn.

When your organisation depends on effectively begging people for money, out of the goodness of their hearts, with a tragic story/context with which to 'sell' yourself - however noble it is and however faithfully or neglectfully you abide by that stated aim/cause - it's a very different matter.

Whilst I'm absolutely not of the opinion that people who head/direct large charities shouldn't be reasonably rewarded, I think a lot of them are only using the charity and the position for as much as they can possibly get out off the back of its good name. They're very happy for hundreds or thousands of the foot-soldiers of the charity to work for absolutely no pay at all, yet when it comes to their own already-privileged salary, they will often fight for the very most that they can possibly get - including all the perks, because 'they are worth it'. Their constant justification is "I could get so much more in private industry", but their countless volunteers earning nothing never seem to pull that justification.

Their very survival depends on persuading shelf-stackers, binmen, cleaners and pensioners to give as much as they can possibly guilt them into giving; but I'd be very interested to know how many of them give back proportionally (i.e. the 50% or more that they could well manage to get by decently without) to the charity from their wages.

@SeanBeansMealDeal without these ceos and experienced professionals the charities wouldn't be run anywhere near as successfully - they do need to operate like businesses

I have worked in the charity sector for 17 years and I know our ceo earns highly- I also know how much extra support we have been able to give to those in need because of our well thought out business strategy and improvement in funds.

Volunteers yes they volunteer for feee- but they don't have to. That is key here. They also recieve reward other than pay and their own motivations are often not orientated around a financial reward

Thank you @Supersimkin2 and @Crapuscular and others. I am doing ok, despite everything The SA and some of their members have put me through over the years, though it has taken over 2 decades to get to this point. I now work for a small charity where I help safeguard vulnerable people and have a wonderful DD who lights up my life.

I had a really bad experience with salvation army I would never donate or work for them again the way they bullied and verbally abused me I've since left their shop I wont tell you all the full story but back in 2009 I was down on my luck and lost my house and boyfriend and some family members all in one go. I asked them for help with getting me back on my feet and with housing if I could do some volunteer work for them they let me live on the streets with no where to go no income and just a carry bag of clothes. They never got me hot meal never once helped me at all with anything I was constantly swore at by older female working there and bullied to the point of me just wanted to take my own life. I havent forgiven or forgotten what they did I went down to 5 stone in weight and caught a serious life threatening infection ended up in hospital. This company is all for giving to others and helping them so they say but they never once helped me they left me with absolutely nothing. I've not worked for them since nor have I ever never ever donated to them I wont support them. These adverts are so misleading on telly they dont help people down on their luck at all