I recently had to take the horrible decision to have my 18-year-old cat put to sleep. Due to my ongoing ill health and shielding since March 2020 all of my shopping has been done online, including cat food and litter. To avoid running out and shipping costs, I bulk buy both items and had stocked up only a week before my cat was diagnosed with an inoperable tumour. So I thought the best thing to do was donate it all to a local rescue centre.
I phoned the closest one to me, run by a husband and wife, left a message with the husband who said his wife would call back, she didn't so I called back again (in case he had forgotten to tell her) and left an answerphone message....silence has been the only reply.
So, I looked up another rescue centre, no phone number available, but there was an email address. I emailed them and 3 days later I had a reply saying they would ask the person who dealt with such things to contact me......silence reigns from them too.
My next idea was to contact our local food bank, my reasoning being that some of those in need would also have pets to feed. They were extremely grateful for my offer as they have a lot of families who have pets but pet food isn't an item that they are regularly offered as a donation and someone is now coming to collect it all at the weekend, but should it really be this difficult to help those who are often appealing on Facebook and local websites for donations? I understand that these are small concerns run by people who have other stuff going on in their lives, but honestly a simple yes or no would have taken 5 minutes. I had even offered to deliver it all (from a safe distance)!