Am I being unreasonable to be mad as hell about a scam going on at this charity shop?

[Bunpea]

Am I being unreasonable to think there is a scam going on at a local charity shop?

I took three bags of things to my local charity shop for a well-known mental health charity. My OH took the bags in to the shop at the front. The bags contained ‘good’ stuff (mainly nice clothes, with some new bedding still in the cellophane wrappers). All good enough to have sold on eBay, but I want to support this charity.

The shop has a car park round the back you can pull in to. I drove round there to turn around and wait for OH.
In the car park was a man sorting through boxes and bags of goods, putting some things into three large zip-up shopping bags, and everything else he put in a skip.
Into the skip went lots of kids toys which looked in great condition - plastic ride-ons, a small dolls house, soft toys, toy cars, as well as books and other stuff. He kept testing the weight of the bags - presumably he was taking them somewhere.
He seemed uncomfortable that I was there, lit a cigarette, picked up a few random pieces of small litter (but did nothing about the bigger mess) and generally hung around.

Just as OH appeared at the side of the car, the shop manageress opened the back door of the shop and handed the man one of my bags.
I got out and asked her if the stuff I had donated was no use to them, that I was never sure what was useful to donate, and if it was no good would take it back and deal with it another way.
She hastily grabbed the bag back from the man, saying it was ‘being taken upstairs to be sorted’ (no it wasn’t), and that ‘we sell it all’.
Hmmmm.

I can understand that charity shops probably use dealers for disposing of some goods they can’t sell, and that some stuff goes for rags. Or that they move stock from shop to shop. But this didn’t look like that. And all the good stuff that had gone in that skip…
Am I being unreasonable to be mad as hell about a scam going on at this charity shop?

I was in a charity shop once and they gave my child a free hand knitted toy. It was beautiful. They said they couldn't sell it due to regulations. I left a donation.

It might be that they bag up some really good stuff to sell on eBay to get more money for it.

The scam is - I assume - that someone unrelated to the charity shop was taking the stuff and making a profit from it.

sounds entirely plausible to me OP

and a different issue to that of what charity shops may or may not with donations that may or may not be ethical

I imagine the scam is that the skip is not actually stuff going to waste - it's where the good stuff is sorted and stored before it gets sold on eBay or on FB marketplace to line someone else's pocket?

every charity shop in my town puts up "no more donations today" signs when they are full 😏

I was sorting clothes yesterday for a children’s clothing exchange, about 50% of it goes to rags. Sometimes the clothes are wearable theoretically but we know nobody will take it, it will be there for years. If clothes aren’t immaculate (bobbling, whites have gone grey, pictures are cracked) they go whereas the donator may have through they were fine. Basically all the socks go to rags because we have boxes and boxes of socks.

A lot of it is of course absolutely gross too.

I work for a big charity in one of their shops/donation sorting stations and can confirm that this is NOT usual. Please report this to head office and speak to someone senior. Our charity had this issue some years back with donations never reaching sorting let alone sale and it cost the charity £££'s. Staff get a discount on sales in most shops (I do) but everything has to be checked and labelled first so that it's fair to the charity. What this manager is doing is very wrong and the man out the back is probably taking the best stuff and selling it on FB Market place/car booting/ Ebaying etc and is likely related to the manager but regardless it is theft. Please report it. In our case head office were suspicious and investigated for 6 months before reporting it to the police with the evidence and the staff (and volunteers involved) were sacked.

Surely you just stop taking donations and reduce your stock prices down to pennies and it goes? We have a charity shop outlet shop pretty much everything is a pound the stock turnover is rapid kids clothing four items for a pound never see the same thing in two weeks in a row because it all goes

Similar with a small charity shop if something doesn't sell its put on the pound rail it either goes or after a week its ragged

Yes some of the shops do but it's the large donation centres that don't like to do it. But they are the ones that are the ones most overloaded with donations.

I don't think it's a scam, just more likely distribution of items in a way you weren't expecting. I imagine charity shops receive a lot of tat that is complexly unusable and they will have to sift through what they can sell in shops, what they can (presumably) sell to 'buy by the kilo fabric' places and sadly stuff that just has to be skipped.

Unless you were really close, you presumably can't be sure if this man was skipping good quality toys. They might have been chipped, broken or really dirty and otherwise not fit for sale. Charity shops can't afford to have dead stock sitting round on their shelves.

FWIW, I think charities should be transparent though. A simple notice to explain that if items are deemed not fit for sale, they may not be used etc etc.

The scam is that the shop worker and the bloke out the back are working together. She takes the stuff round the back, he puts in the skip what is worth having and then takes it to sell on eBay and they make a profit from it.

I’d imagine charity shops are rife with people who work there purely because they know there is money to be made for themselves from other people’s donations.

I would absolutely report to the charity head office. If they’ve not done anything wrong then there’s no issue. But I would bet money the shop worker is on the make.

I get emails from the charity shop I donate to, which tell me how much my things made for the charity ( to do with tax).
Ive noticed that the sums have been much lower than a few years ago, despite sending in good quality stuff.

Not if he is the owner of the skip?

And yet charity shop prices have gone up hugely over the past few years. I’ve seen clothes for sale in charity shops which were actually cheaper new, so I would have expected your donations to have gone up not down…

My dsis used to take any designer stuff home and either keep for herself or sell it on eBay she found it hilarious

Hopefully they've tightened things up now

Does sound dodgy to me

I'd question it with their HO

I’ve seen this before from another well known charity shops. Donations go in the front then the majority straight into the skip out the back. There’s usually a guy there sorting through bits, they go into his car and off he goes. We see this on a daily basis so it’s not a one off.

It's so dishonest isn't it?

In future maybe sell your items on eBay, Vinted, marketplace etc and then donate the money direct to the charity your wish to support.

I think OP is concerned that this is not charity endorsed activity and that the woman working in the shop might be subverting bags of decent stuff to an external accomplice and in effect stealing from the charity?

All of the info on this thread is so sad. Luckily, we have a large children and family charity which takes clothes/ toys/ equipment and redistributes to those in need. You call and ask if they need your stuff- checking ages of clothes etc- before drop.off. It's wonderful as you know your things are going where they're needed for free. They also ask for good quality PJs/ underwear etc, which most charities don't take. I think every city/town should have one.

All my local charity shops are full of Primark shite that I’d never have bought in the first place, never mind pre-loved and the shops stink.

I was flabbergasted the other week to come across a Zara Jacket, a beautiful wool tailored Houndstooth Coast blazer and a little denim skirt from Mango. Based on sizing I assume all were donated by the same woman. There was also a brown velvet Hobbs blazer but I didn’t buy that. Spent £13 in total.

Maybe best to sell to ebay or Vinted and donate the money to the charity instead.

I ran into a not too dissimilar situation that completely put me off charity shops / charity organizations. Now I post items in batches online for free and then drop it off to people who actually need it. More work on my part but at least I know it is going to 1) get to people who need it, and 2) not end up in landfill right away / get more use. I have also dropped things off to places that are in direct need (women's shelters etc) when they put out a call for specific things. I now try to skip the middle man / organization / charity with any charitable donating I do.