To be annoyed the charity shop would not accept my donation

[Bearbehind]

I've had a bit of a clear out and had some stuff to take the the charity shop.

I checked on line it was open today then took the stuff into town.

You can't park right outside so I carried the stuff, in the snow, to the shop only to see a sign which said they no longer open on Sundays.

Oh well, I thought but, all the lights were on and I could see at least 3 people inside so I knocked the door and someone opened it.

He said they were shut and I explained I didn't want to come in, just drop these donations off.

He outright refused to accept them, because they were shut, and I'd have to go to another branch of theirs that was open today or come back tomorrow.

AIBU to think that if someone has made the effort to bring a donation to a charity shop and if there's are people there, they should accept them.

I'll be buggered if I'm taking stuff to them again.

This thread has opened my eyes quite a lot.

The sheer number of excuses not to accept the very items that they exist to sell makes me think it's not worth bothering, so in future I won't.

Good for you OP.

Maybe they would have found all the stuff you donated to be utter rubbish they can't sell, so definitely don't donate in the future. I'm sure they'll survive without your magnanimity.

But OP that's irrelevant - you actually wanted the service of getting the stuff taken off their hands, for free.

You just had to ring or check their website first.

Maybe they would expat but the reality is they didn't bother checking; that wasn't the reason they didn't accept my items.

This assumption the everyone donates shite is incredibly patronising too.

These were good quality, barely used, some new, items. Not that it matters for the purpose of this discussion.

Annoying that you couldn't leave your donation. Anyone who says you should have left it outside is not being helpful. Apart from the possibility of theft of bags, or their being torn open and the contents thrown around, they also get peed on by dogs. No one is going to want to open those or even take them into the shop.
The charity shops which are most appreciative tend to be the smaller local ones. I agree with earlier posters that some of the bigger ones just want look like clothing shops. They arrange clothes by colour instead of size now. It may look more impressive but if I want a pair of trousers, colour unimportant, I'd rather find everything in my size on the same rail than have to look in several places.
Also if I want to read a book I'm not concerned if it looks a bit yellowed around the edges. Some shops only want books which look unread.

you actually wanted the service of getting the stuff taken off their hands, for free.

That's exactly the kind of comment that means I won't bother in future.

I could easily have stuck it all in a bin bag and put it outside my house if I wanted it getting rid of for free.

Instead I put it in my car, drove into town and carried it to the shop, spoke to someone there and couldn't leave the stuff.

If I'm in the wrong for doing that as opposed to just putting a bin bag outside my door then the world has gone mad.

"Yabu. They don't have to take your junk"
Whats the point in charity shops, thEn
Just donate to another charity then, op
There are plenty out there would graciously accept your items.

You just had to ring or check their website first.

And I did check their website first

YANBU, but, don't blame the volunteers. Blame the corporate management who fail to keep their website up-to-date, and probably put in the rule that donations can't be accepted when the store is shut.

The snobbery on here about charity shops and workers is so disrespectful. They are not serfs who should be so grateful to be tossed your offcasts that they should either tend to you immediately or be punished by you taking your designer treasures elsewhere ffs.

For the shit and rudeness you've taken from the shop in question and some on here after trying to do a decent thing.
You'd be just as well selling stuff and making yourself a few bob. You don't get any better thought of trying others, well as you've seen.

YABU - would you go to any other business and expect them to deal with you, even if they were closed (regardless of what the, clearly not updated website said)? You would be justified to be annoyed that they weren't open but why did you feel that they should have to take your items because there were people in the building? Whatever the reason, the volunteer informed you that your donation could not be accepted at that time. He could have made an exception, but what if he'd already turned away 10 other people that morning? If he "made an exception" for everyone, they may have ended up with a whole pile of bags/boxes requiring attention that either the volunteers don't have time/authority to go through, so he made the decision to stick to the rules he has been asked to enforce.

I used to work in a small shop where there was just the shop floor and a tiny cupboard for my coat/bag (so no back room or anywhere I could work out of sight). Store opening times were 10-4 but I was expected to be there from 9-5 to open/close/do admin etc. On an average day I would get at least half a dozen people rattling the door handle, knocking on the window and/or shouting at me through the glass because since I was still in the shop I should be happy to serve them - even though the hours were posted on the door they were shouting through, the door was locked, the very large closed sign was clearly hung up and all the main lights were off. Just because someone is in the building does not mean they have any obligation to deal with customers if the store itself is closed.

You may have checked the general website but most people - if they are going to make a special trip, in inclement weather and knowing that they would have to trek the bags to the shop - would usually phone the specific store to a) check they were open b) confirm they were accepting donations and/or c) check when was the best time to drop said items off at the store.

Also, was it imperative that you got rid of those items today? I have a large bag of donations to take to one of my town's many charity shops but, whilst I could do with getting it out of the way, I have no intention of making a special trip just to drop them off today, even though today is my one day off this week and it would be a fairly straightforward job. I would rather take the inconvenience of the bag sitting in my hallway for a few extra days and take it with me to drop off when I'm in the town centre for my dentist appointment on Tuesday, than make a special trip out on today in the bad weather.

Maybe they were doing their annual stock-take?

Around 80% of goods donated to charity shops is rejected/dumped anyway. They have to cope with "gifts" of utter crap such as loft clear-outs and jumble sale leftovers.

This assumption the everyone donates shite is incredibly patronising too I think you've misunderstood... or taken the real experience of those of us who work in charity shops as a personal insult. But it is true that a sizeable % of donations are not saleable.

As a poster has said, we love the people who give us clothing with RAGS on the bag. They get it, we can put that in for the rag man, paid for by the kilo, without having to waste too much time.

We can't put out obviously worn clothing, nobody buys it. Kids toys seem to need to be perfect too. It isn't the staff that make that decision, it is the buying public. Everyone wants perfect for pennies.

I was just trying to explain how it might not be how you expect, others have said much the same. But you don't seem to have taken any of that on board, just stuck with your original pov. Which is sad, but, to be perfectly honest, I doubt the shop you went to will miss your donation, they will still have plenty to sort through, come Monday morning!

Drive to a supermarket with one of those massive donation bins and pop it in there. No snow trudging and it goes to charity without the negative interaction.

The sheer number of excuses not to accept the very items that they exist to sell makes me think it's not worth bothering

Charity shops do not exist to sell your unwanted stuff, they exist to bring in as much revenue for their charity as possible, which is a subtle difference but it is a difference nonetheless. That does not mean they are obligated to take in anything they are given at any time.

Many of the larger chains of charity shops get given items that they cannot sell in the store that receives them or have certain stores drowning in donations and others that get nothing so they have to send things to central distribution hubs for them to redistribute more evenly, all of which costs money and time, so sometimes if they are in the midst of some re-organization of stock it is better for them to suspend accepting donations until they have got on top of the donations they already have and annoy potential donors that can't unload their post-clearout stuff than it is to take more items than they can handle.

This is especially relevant at this time of year as December and January are often the times when charities receive the most donations as every one has pre and post Christmas clearouts, which means that some charity shops are drowning in donations and just can't keep up with the supply relative to their regular donation streams throughout the rest of the year.

Im quite surprised at the level of contempt shown towards donors by some on this thread. I must admit to starting to wonder why I don't eBay my stuff in future if it's all tat, offcasts, shit I cba to take to the skip..........and wondering if it's a bit of snobbery towards charity shops in general for selling offcasts, tat, shit people cba to take to the skip.....

Exactly lovesagain.

Clearly not everyone donates shite or the shops would be empty.

If those slagging off donors have simply made those of use who donate decent stuff not bother in the future then they should congratulate themselves on a job well done- not

They told you of another shop that was open, Bearbehind. Yes, no doubt it was annoying to be turned away when you had checked and thought they would be open, but you seem far too intent on being self-righteous, rather than accepting it was just one of those things. Clearly they have a lot to do on a Sunday if they are no longer capable of opening but still have to come into work. At least you can rest assured that you pissed them off as much as they pissed you off! It's not as if they should have to feel grateful for you giving them yet more work to do - they don't benefit from it, the charity does, so just as there is an obvious limit to your altruism (apparently you can't be arsed to donate to them again, because they were not sufficiently gracious and grateful), there is a limit to theirs (they are already giving hours of their time to the charity and it's hard therefore to feel grateful to someone who thinks they are being overwhelmingly generous to get rid of some of their stuff on a Sunday when the shop is closed).

better for them to suspend accepting donations

Suspend?
The charity shop that did the sniffy "we're currently too full to accept new donations" has never had a donation from me since. They might think that it was a "suspend" but I took offence and made it a "terminate" instead.
I donate to small-local-charity (i.e. grateful) shops these days.

Pefectly put roundabout

They were shut. End of story.

If the library is shut when I want to return some books, even though they may want those books back, and even though there may be members of staff inside doing end of day routines, I can't demand that they take my books in, because, well, they're shut.

I am a teacher. I am often in school during the holidays. That doesn't mean that someone passing by can ask me to childmind their child [yes, it has been tried] because the school isn't open for children. it is open for staff, but not for children.

It was very polite of the member of staff to have the courtesy to ope the door and speak to you to tell you where you COULD take your donations - to the next one of their branches that was open to receive them. They probably thought it was politer than ignoring you, though in the event ignoring you would probaly have brought a better outcome.

They were shut. I, tbh, always ring up and ask whether they need what i am bringing in that day - if they don't, I ask when they would next be able to take it in, and store it until then.

You could say that by getting in a hissy fit about not be allowed to leave your stuff behind, you now want to punish the beneficiaries of the charity. You will not be punishing the unpaid volunteers, after all, as they don't benefit from your actions one way or the other.