in thinking that, if you donate to a charity, they should not send you letters asking for more money?

[LadySybilDeChocolate]

I'm quite irritated to be honest. I have a monthly DD set up to a 'wildlife' charity. I'm being bombarded with emails and, today, I've received a letter asking me to increase my donation! AIBU to cancel the DD altogether?

I stopped for the same reason, I had 3 on the go once. Also when you give to relief funds you may get Red Cross or somesuch ringing you at teatime and when you say you're busy making dinner they say said well the people we're asking money for don't have that luxury! NOw I just give loads of stuff to charity shops and put money in charity boxes/buckets.

I'm afraid the RSPCA have lost me for aggressive marketing calls; last year I reported animal abuse to them, and gave my name and details as requested as they said I might have to be a witness in a court case.

A few weeks later I was called by someone who said he worked for them asking for a direct debit donation. I said no, my income is so variable that direct debits for anything but the necessities of life are not possible. (100% true BTW, not an avoidance technique.) I then said I would be happy to help fundraise as a volunteer, but he would not stop banging on about direct debits. In the end I hung up.

I appreciate what Coffee says about a steady income stream, but outsourcing the work to call-centres (because I can't imagine even the most die-hard volunteers doing these sort of calls) just winds people up.

I'm sticking to small local charities.

YANBU not to want to be harassed but YABU to do a face after talking about marketing, LadyS. Charities are not just businesses, they are fundraising organisations to combat specific problems, so of course they are 'marketing' - aka letting people know what they do!

Cancel the DD if you want to, but personally I think it's a petulant response. DP is a charity fundraising manager and those people get crappy wages and work all the hours that God sends trying to keep worthwhile causes afloat in a horrendously difficult market. Of course they are trying to keep people giving, it's not some kind of self-perpetuating scam, they are trying to keep money coming in to support the good work they are doing. When govt grants are being cut and loads of people are cancelling DDs due to losing their jobs, they have to make sure they are careful keeping support going.

If you don't believe in the charity, cancel the DD.

If you do, continue to give what you can afford, but fgs ring their fundraising officer directly and talk through your concerns! Some charities do outsource these phone calls, so if the people they're employing aren't getting it right, they need to know.

I don't think flouncing is particularly helpful in this situation.

randommoment you are wrong, my DP is a fundraising officer and this is a significant part of his job. In fact, loads of volunteers also do this at the large charity he works for - it's one reason they are often a bit odd, because they are NOT professionally trained!

Many charities outsource, some don't.

And of the ones that do, it is often because it is cheaper for them to employ another firm to do it - and therefore a better use of donations. It's not because they're evil money-grabbing bastards. It means more money gets to the actual projects.

I worked in the telephone fundraising department for a National Charity for 5 years and would never work for a charity again.

The telephone numbers were purchased from a company that bought them from BT. Where I worked the telephonists were given weekly targets of how many people to recruit and if they were not met they were given formal warnings. If after the 3rd week the targets were still not met then they were dismissed. This proceedure was authorised by Human Resources.

As an office many thousands of pounds was raised, names added to the donor database etc but still did not stop the charity from making us all redundant as the office was not cost effective (for every £1 we raised it cost 50p). As Charities have to be accountable for every penny it seems they are more ruthless than a business.

As earlier stated - I would never, ever work for a charity again.

How is it more efficient for charities to lose donations from pissed off contributors?

God yes the WWF are shocking for this - the last time they called though I said "Tick the box NOW that says if I get another call I cancel ALL my family's subscriptions" and have never had another marketing call as was so upset by their hardcore sale technique.

For other charities and doorsteppers I just say I give so much already I can't afford it and if they argue ask "so tell me how much do you donate?" and when they look uncomfortable (I don't try that on the ones who are obviously totally dedicated but the ones who are doing it for the money) tell them I don't judge them - it is a job for them but don't give me a hard time.

I like to give when I choose to loads of odd things not give all my spare income to direct marketing firms

KatieScarlett it's more efficient because they lose relatively few, (especially if they are responsive when people request to be taken off lists), and they gain much more.

Iloveonionrings your experience sounds very poor practice from an HR point of view but it would be a mistake to work on the basis that all national charities operate that way. Most of them make some mistakes yes, but on the whole are trying their best to raise money for some extremely good causes while treating donors and staff well at the same time.

Those people who have asked for no more contact and still been harassed, I think you are right to stop donations but I also think it's very important to write to the Fundraising Director and tell him/her why. You obviously believed in the causes to begin with, so the best thing to do is give feedback where it counts and hope they can fix things so they don't lose other donors as well.

I totally agree. I think it borders on harassment sometimes.
I have had standing orders with at least 10 different popular charities and cancelled every direct debit for the same reason. It is so upsetting giving £10 a month for example and getting so many letters/pens/cards/phone calls that you know your money has been spent trying to get you to spend more. It feels dishonest.

I have tried to opt out of further correspondence from UNICEF, NSPCC and cancer research - they have all ignored me and I have cancelled the DIrect Debit.

Do you know that flowery ?

Do the call centres log all the times they are told that donors will be cancelling their existing DD/Won't be doing any more fundraising because of repeated calls?

Do charities routinely poll their ex-contributors and established exactly why donors have cancelled their DD/stopped fundraising?

I ask because I have done both and no-one ever asked me. I'm pretty sure the NMW paid call-centre operator working on a sign-up customer or fail-to-reach-target-and-get-sacked contract will not be shouting about THAT call to their team leader or to the charity they are promoting.

I've sent you a PM lottie

Of course I don't mind. I wouldn't have set it up otherwise but I am concerned that they don't do checks on the people they sign up. Arthur, for example, could be very vulnerable. He could have DD's with several charities because he's been told that it's the right thing to do. Arthur doesn't like to say no to them because he's not confident enough so every time they call him to increase his DD he agrees. Arthur is now left with barely enough income to survive. I know this is extreme, but how do the charities know?

Barnados have been fine, they send me letters occasionally but never a hard sell to increase my DD.

Shelter, OTOH, their fund-raisers rang me too often and last time I was very fed up with them - please can you double your DD? Er, no. Ok, how about increasing it by 50% then? I told them if they rang me again for more money I was cancelling - the calls did stop.

As others have said, it's a fine balance. If they really have been 'bombarding you' then I would contact them to let them know how annoying it is, OTOH, it's not unreasonable to send a 'Thank You' letter each year and say, while they appreciate the fact you give regularly, is there anyway you might be able to increase it. If you don't ask, you are very unlikely to get. Their job is to find the 'zone' where asking might make you revise your payment upwards, rather than cancelling altogether.

KatieScarlett,

Many, many, charities do measure the number of donors that cancel. Some also do research into why people stop giving, but of course many of the angry ones don't want anything to do with the charity again so their views don't get recorded. Most people just say when asked that they couldn't afford it at the time.

As others have said, charities tend to be quite attentive of the cost of recruiting and upgrading donors and if it doesn't make money, it gets stopped. Direct mail response rates can be really low and you need to send hundreds to get a donation so all the refusals are factored into the cost. Basically, if you don't ask, you don't get and people who give to charity are a much better target than the people who have never done so in the past. Obviously they don't want to loose people but there will always be some who a particular campaign annoyed.

If you are unhappy with what has gone on, especially with telemarketers, write directly to the fundraising director complaining and or demanding to be taken off the lists. Any decent charity should take data protection seriously.

Flowery - Admittedly this was 10 years ago but it was common practice to dismiss telephonists for not reaching their targets.

The manager on one occasion asked a telephonist why she could not let her 7year old son travel to his ice skating lesson on the bus on his own so she could work a Saturday morning, journey of 8 miles into the CIty Centre. Office was under the threat of closure and manager had decided on opening for 4 hours on a Saturday morning and insisted everyone had to work them. (Apart from herself who we never saw on a Saturday)

On the day of 9/11 - manager phoned into the office (once she had got home at 4:30pm) to insist that the telephonists carried on phoning until the end of the shift at 8:30pm.

It does sound as if it was more the manager than the charity but every decision she made regarding staff, shifts etc was made after advice from HR. This was not a small local charity but one of the top 5 national charities.

As a call centre, telephonists had log in IDs, passwords etc and all calls were logged. If a complaint was made regarding a call then it was easily traced back to the telephonist. There are options to log responses from the donor and as an office it was strict policy to log them correctly. However even if we logged a call as a 'Do not contact again' request the charities head fundraising department would still contact them for mass mailings for donations, the message being the contact asked not to be contacted for xxx type of fundrasing but their circumstances may now have changed and they may be more willing to donate this way instead.

Sorry if this sounds very negative but after donating to other charities and stipulated it was on one off contribution no need to contact me again and still be contacted several times - it does seem that charities do harass and there practices are similar.

which charities usually ?

I have an interest in this, you see, as I fundraise as a volunteer for a small local charity.

another thing that's REALLY annoying is that they print your name and address in about 99 places all over the rubbish they send you so you have to be careful to shred it all - not necessary surely?

I cancelled my DD with a charity after I started getting somewhat aggressive telephone calls constantly.

I wrote to them and told them why I was cancelling. I doubt it made any difference.

I understand that charities need to raise revenue, but harrassing people who already do so and pushing them to cancel their donation seems somewhat counter productive.

The sally army are always polite and grateful when they write and they never phone, so it CAN be done in a way which only endears the charity to you and reminds you about them at the same way, but most do it the shitty way that just makes me wanna strike them off my list!

and they dont send piles of glossy expensive looking stuff that must eventually add up to more than my donation either, they just write a simply thank you letter a month after your donation!

the WWF send SOOOOO much glossy stuff, made me I thought I was donating to the zoologists not to an exercise in glossy marketing!

I've cancelled two DDs last year; I'd asked both not to write, e-mail or ring and in return, my DD would continue. I started getting phone calls from one and then found that the other had passed on/sold my details to another charity. I asked both to stop, telling them that the next instances meant I would cancel - and they carried on, so I cancelled. I'll never support either again.

Some charities seem to be acting like double-glazing companies - and I don't give money to those either.

I'm supporting small, unfunded charities now and happy to do so.

I donated on behalf of ds last Christmas, was then sent a brochure of things I could buy and a begging letter info on a snow leapard. I was then sent another brochure of further campaigns I could give them money for, then another set of begging letters info for the snow leapard, then four other begging letters things I barely read before putting them into the recycling. On top of this I get emails almost monthly, sometimes once a week, about their campaigns and why they need more cash. It's a tad like the Big Issue bloke asking you to buy him lunch, then a drink, then a new pair of trainers, then a coat... You'd get pissed off with it after a while.

I would understand you cancelling 'cause it's annoying being asked to increase but I don't think they are being unreasonable to ask you to increase - it's just a way of getting to those who maybe were thinking about increasing it but never got around to it etc.

I feel very conflicted about aggressive fundraising 'cause it irritates the hell out of me but, having worked within a charity, I can see how it can produce results and be necessary to keep things going...

But stubborncow, if donators had the extra money or inclination to give more - they would, surely? What's the point in asking somebody who already pays - to pay more when there is a good chance that they will be irked at beig asked for more money? I increased my donations when I had a payrise. I just find it so incredibly rude and completely defeating the purpose to harrass existing subscribers. Perhaps, when more people cancel, the charities will learn and change their practices.

LyingWitch - most people, I think, are very rubbish at getting around to things and/or might set up the DD and forget about it, more or less so it wouldn't occur to them to increase it.

I do agree with you that it's really annoying to be asked for more and makes you feel negatively about something you should be feeling positively about but, the bottom line is, I think, that it gains more than it loses! Especially, as someone said, if they are good about taking you off the "ask for more money" list if you ask.

I know my parents were asked to contribute to a hockey pitch development at my fee-paying school - they were asked for a minimum donation which irked them a lot - they felt like saying "well, we were going to give you minimum donation - 1euro but since that's not acceptable, we'll be going with nothing". They then came across teh same strategy at my brothers' school - it seemed to be the done thing at that point..and, I think, tried and tested though a very rude seeming tactic imo.