To think that charities should be better at saying thank you? A donor's lament.

[FreshFreesias]

Some years ago I set up a Trust that makes substantial donations to small and medium animal charities and I am often disappointed to rarely be thanked or acknowledged. Of course, I don’t donate to receive a pat on the back, but it is distressing to receive a generic printed-out thank you form for a 5 figure donation, to have my name misspelt or even, bizarrely, have my bank thanked in a charity’s annual report rather than the Trust.

There is rarely any follow up describing how a donation was spent and what value it has created.

What charities don’t understand is that if they take the time to build up personal relationships with their donors, especially their large donors, they will be ahead of the pack and we will continue to donate to them and remember them in our wills.

I once made a 10k donation to a respected medium-sized charity and in a note with the cheque said I would like to be more involved with elephant and dolphin conservation. I got a lovely note back from the CEO, who I have met before, asking me to contact his secretary to organise a meeting. I’m not sure why the secretary couldn’t contact me herself but never mind. So I duly emailed the secretary and never heard anything back.

Astonishingly, given this tawdry treatment, (I was so upset on discovering that African baby elephants were being torn from their herds to sell to Chinese zoos and this charity specialises in zoo welfare), I contacted the CEO again, pledging 20k to kick start a campaign about this. Again he emailed me, copying in his (presumably very busy) secretary, saying she would contact me to organise a meeting, but she never did. Presumably they are so overwhelmed with large donations, they couldn’t be bothered to follow up mine.

I've had more luck with small rescue charities in Europe, who maintain regular contact, make us feel we are doing something worthwhile and are making a difference.

AIBU to think that charities should spend as much time thanking and building relationships with donors as they do in crafting their appeals for dosh?

Like AutumnRose I have worked for large charities and the waste of funds is heartbreaking, of course in annual reports it’s all accounted for in acceptable categories but the reality is very, very different
I would never go near a big charity again with even £1, small honest down to earth organisations that do as they claim are worth every penny IME

The charities who know how to fulsomely thank will be ones who spend a fortune of 'engagement' and 'brand'. More fool you for wanting that.

• On one hand, thanking donors is just good manners so charities should do it.

• On the other hand, thanking donors costs time and resources, so ultimately it would mean less money going to the cause.

I don't think the size of the donation should make a difference. Donations are usually proportionate to the individual's disposable income.

Personally I prefer small local charities, not big nationals with marketing budgets and the ability to post out free pens with their appeals.

The choice is yours though. If your dissatisfaction with their lack of thanks outweighs your reason for donating in the first place, then vote with your feet and take your money elsewhere.

And spending millions changing the wording on their branding. One leading charity has just done this - taken a couple of words out of the logo costing millions to replace every pen, leaflet, signage, employees fleece, lanyard etc. Absolute waste of donated money !

Felicity Donor, the Third Sector blogger, started quite a debate last month when she declared that charities shouldn't waste money on "fluffy thank-you letters".
Her views are widely shared: the British public is massively illogical in how it regards charity expenditure.
But in her book Tiny Essentials of Raising Money from Foundations and Trusts, Jo Habib, director of FunderFinder, says: "Any fundraiser who doesn't thank donors properly is an idiot as well as rude."
I agree with Jo. Of course it's rude, and foolish, for a charity not to acknowledge every gift it receives and reassure the donor that it's been put to the intended use.
Imagine if, as a child, you never acknowledged the socks or diaries your grannies and aunties provided without fail, year in, year out. No more socks and diaries. Ever.
Yet 'mystery shoppers', who provide feedback to the sector on customer service, consistently show that as a profession we are truly crap at saying "thank you" properly, and at reassuring donors that their gifts have been safely received and wisely applied.
And then we wonder why we can't keep our supporters. Perhaps we don't deserve them.
The simple fact is that an appropriate thank-you letter is perhaps the best fundraising opportunity of all. If it can convert a first-time donor into a regular giver, then surely thanking people is a no-brainer.
A prompt response that properly acknowledges the gift cements the relationships between charities and donors. This is blindingly obvious. The commercial value of timely and careful thanks has been shown time and time again.
The fact that people still share Felicity's view is our fault, not theirs.
The only reason that a donor might think a charity should not send a polite note of thanks is that we've allowed them to imagine otherwise. We are fools for not rectifying this misconception quickly.
Some charities persist in saying they will thank donors only for gifts of more than £10, or only if the donor specifically asks for acknowledgement.
So the unappreciated donor can hardly be blamed for leaving the residue of their estate to some other, more polite and perhaps more deserving cause.
Of course I don't want to inconvenience my children by asking that they write me thank-you letters for my sacrifices in their direction over the years. But if they don't show appreciation, I certainly won't do it again.

FACT FILE - You're welcome
Research by consultancy McConkey-Johnston International UK found that first-time donors who receive a personalised thank you within 48 hours of making a donation are four times more likely to give again than those not thanked promptly.

The above was pasted in from the Third Sector website.

You're not giving the money to the charity workers though. You're giving it to the dolphins, elephants and homeless people. Who I assume you don't want a letter from and who, presumably, you are doing it for.

I've worked for government and non-profits my whole life. At a conservative estimate I've given up hundreds of thousands of pounds in wages compared to jobs that weren't charity. No one has written to me saying thanks.

Selflessness, that's the thing. You do it for the better world, not the thanks.

@MrsTerryPratchett, to the contrary, the organisations and charities that take the time to send an email or message explaining where a donation will go and to build personal relationships, are the ones who are, in my experience, efficiently run, will stretch funds available and create more value.

Really, writing an email or picking up the phone does not take hours or cost thousands of pounds.

I'm a trusts fundraiser and this all sounds shocking. I'd be livid if any of my team treated a donor this way - i love my trusts, they are the reason we can help our beneficiaries.

AutumnRose1
As a result, I wouldn't donate to any big charity.

Same here!! Local charities every time.

"Well, if they treated their donors with a bit of respect and courtesy they wouldn't have to spend so much time on fundraising and would have less work all round"

And you think they would use their largesse to fix better staffing at admin level so people weren't overworked?

I suspect you won't give a shit about this OP but if it's useful info for others, here's an example

propertyindustryeye.com/over-400-staff-at-shelter-due-to-go-on-strike-over-derisory-pay-offer/

Thank you @ReggaetonLente, thankfully not all charities make donating as soulless and dispiriting. I was going through accounts from earlier days and reliving bad memories.

The people I work with now make me realise I'm making a difference by sharing what we are able to achieve together, with my funds and their work on the ground. Unfortunately, I'm no longer actively rescue at the moment, as I live in a flat and restricted to only 2 rescue dogs at a time.

I used to own an animal sanctuary but had to sell it due to stress and have since set up the Trust with the proceeds. I now work with a handful of rescuers who share their work on Facebook, which is very satisfying and hands on. However, I would like to work with larger charities, but it's less clear where the money is going as you don't have that personal connection. I get that they are under pressure and busy, but when large sums are on offer it would make sense to build closer relationships.

We say thank you to people when they go to the effort of sending us a lovely letter to thank us for our help when we offer our services for free.

It's lovely to receive such letters and makes us feel that someone has valued us.

I got a lovely thankyou this morning for the help I gave someone.

Oh - and I am one of those pesky admin costs people like the OP don't like. Yet without me, the charity couldn't do their job so I think I am a pretty essential admin cost.

Oh - and I and my colleagues don't get paid lots of money. We could earn more in the private sector. We have to account for the money we spend to our funders, give them reports and data and have to fight for funding regularly.

But OP, if we were to receive a large donation, I would ensure that you got a lovely letter.

@Sockypuppet, wow, you sound really twisted. Horrible to put OP down for not knowing all your trendy jargon. Sorry you live in a world where saying thank you is seen as some kind of hugely expensive and unreasonable outrage.

You can check the accounts of charities online and that shows v quickly how much of your donation is going to the cause as opposed to the Director's perks.

K, some things get filed under "admin" or "miscellaneous" when they belong under "totally frivolous unnecessary directorial perk".

I manage a medium size local charity and even a £10 donation gets a thank you letter!
Anyone willing to donate £1000+ I would meet personally to talk about how we could best use their money and what they hope it could achieve
We are extremely transparent about what we do with our funding and agonise to a fiver whether we spend money or not, I shop around for best price for stationery, utilities etc just as I would do in my personal life to make the best of limited funds

ome things get filed under "admin" or "miscellaneous" when they belong under "totally frivolous unnecessary directorial perk

I've only got one experience of working for a charity - but I can assure that our charity has fuck all perks. The Chief Officer goes above and beyond for the charity and we try not to waste money.

I hope that's the ethos of most charities.

I don’t wish to mud sling but there are national charities I no longer support due to knowing how much they waste (previous partnership working etc)

I agree with your sentiments and disappointment. The overwhelming message from this situation and my own experience is to stay with small local charities. I regularly donate much smaller amounts than you mention (£500 to £700) to a local animal charity for specific appeals - surgery for a particular animal for example. Seeing that animal recover and be well and happy is wonderful, as is the personal, heartfelt message from the hard working volunteers at the charity. So heartwarming.

As a contrast, an aunt of ours left a huge sum (over £100,000) to a medium size charity. The estate / executor didn’t even get an acknowledgement, let alone any thanks! I was a volunteer at the charity. I chased and chased the CEO asking for an acknowledgment (they has cashed the big cheque, they had the funds). No proper response just a brush off. Rude.

So I really feel the small animal charities with small overheads and no CEOs (and their busy secretaries) are a more deserving of your funds.

@AutumnRose1, you make no sense. In some posts you complain about charities being wasteful, having witnessed this while working in the charity sector and then when people suggest charities should be more accountable you get in a strop.

Make your bloody mind up.

Sunny I think you must be confusing me with another poster

I am not annoyed at the idea of charities being more accountable?

@AutumnRose1, OP wrote:
"Donators need to be very vigilant and do a lot of research and not take charities on face value".

And your reply:

`So you are really just moaning? don't chase up the admin staff. They've got enough to do'.

Researching charities is a good idea and certainly not `moaning'. If someone makes a huge donation it's only reasonable to expect some feedback, for god's sake.
No wonder charities are in desperate need of funds if people who work for them are as mean-spirited as you.

Sunny, I think you're being disingenuous

My comment about OP moaning was in no way a comment saying "don't do your research".

The OP reads to me as "waaah, I didn't get a thank you for my big donation". My dad was one who told the charities "don't send a thank you letter". And I don't think charities are struggling for money.