To quit my job rather than do this?

[WelshRambler]

Hey all,

Looking for some unbiased advice. Every year my work hold a big event for a small charity the week before Christmas. It raises a lot of money and really makes a huge a difference to the charity. We literally raise more money for the charity in one hour than the charities get in a year. The charity changes every year.

This year I was asked to organise which charity we would partner with, which I duly did. I chose a lovely charity who were really excited. I then went on annual leave leaving both work and the charity with all details confirmed, travel organised etc. I’ve kept in touch with the charity on my time off and they’ve shared some really heart warming and heart wrenching stories that they would like to share. Everything seemed well.

Cue tonight. I’ve been asked by work to stand my charity down with one days notice because work has found a charity that they think will do better on socials.

AIBU to refuse to stand my charity down because 1) it’s wrong and 2) I’m on leave?

I’ve point blank messaged to say I won’t do it but honestly they might force me to. Also, if I don’t stand my charity down and they turn up I will be in big trouble.

I am going to fight this and genuinely would rather quit than do it.

Before anyone suggests it, it’s not possible to have both charities.

WWYD in this situation?

Happy to screw over a small charity for better PR? That's pretty callous.

Have they considered whether they’re going to break any charity legislation?

This. It will be terrible PR for it to get out that your organisation dumped a charity like this right before the event. Make that clear and say it's a reputational risk you were not prepared to take.

It would be worth calling ACAS in the morning for some advice on this, regarding your position if you quit over this, employment tribunal etc.

It's refreshing to read about someone having so much integrity. Seems lacking these days sadly. Good for you, I'd do the same.

Definitely stand your ground. They asked you to arrange this, you did the work. If they wanted a different charity they should have selected a charity before asking you to do the work.

I quit a job once with immediate effect after finding out the boss (total cock) was getting me to bill clients for work he hadn't done. It was just something I couldn't get over, so I get where you are coming from OP. Sometimes you just have to stand your ground and go with what you believe in. Good luck, I really hope they do the right thing.

The charity they want you to dump may not have socials but I guarantee they have a great local network. That is how small charities survive. There will be reputational damage to your company if there is a last minute swop after all the lead up.

Just because your company haven't announced it on social media doesn't mean its not common knowledge in the real world where journalists love a story, where real people go on social media and say x said it was us! And dumped us!

Email to your personal email all correspondence including what's app screen shots.

Surely your co workers are taken aback?

Ps- taking annual leave? Ffs, say no. Either it's paid or in lieu. Unbelievable.

@WelshRambler That is awful!

The (small?) charity that you had chosen will have put time, and money into preparing for this. That is money that comes from their voluntary donations. They may have made forward plans and commitments based on the agreement.

If your company rescind on the arrangement (was there not some formal contract?) they will have wasted the volountary donations given to support the charity's purpose. Your company will have, in effect taken from them, rather than giving to them.

I'd quit from a company that did this. And I'd go to the press.

From being involved in similar things I can only imagine that there is a popular 'issue of the moment' (possibly in the mainstream news) that will have everyone at the event thinking that they have solved the world problem (oh the warm feels!)

I agree this is outrageous and would certainly review my future with a company who did this.
But sadly, this won't be the catastrophic PR disaster that some PPs are predicting. And in the unlikely event it ever came to light, it would be explained away as a "misunderstanding/miscommunication". Whilst a charity would be privately pissed off, they're not going to publicly spoil their chances with other future potential donors.

Governments get away with much worse and at the end of the day, the majority of the public don't give a shit. Pension, anyone?!

They're coming at it from a corporate perspective. Not a great approach to charity work, but you need to approach from the same perspective.
"New Charity sounds like a great cause for us to support in future, but for this event we need to stick with Original Charity. We can't let down a charity at such short notice, especially when they've already put time into preparing material (the photos and quotes they've sent will be great for our social posts) - it goes against the ethos of the event and could even bring us negative publicity."

You’re absolutely right to stand your ground on this. To be clear, you were given the task of organising the event and have done so. You were given a position of trust, and empowered to make the commitment on behalf of your company.

If I were you I'd tell them I would personally put it out all over socials, and call every paper as well.

That's so mean. Can they do another fundraiser for the other charity in a few months?

I think this is good advice and definitely emphasise what a huge huge reputational issue it would be to cancel on your charity. If your colleagues haven’t been in cc I would also consider passing on some of the messages you mention the charity sending with the stories and showing how excited they are. Hopefully that will make them feel guilty and start thinking about the impact on your charity too

I'd also wager that the beneficiaries of the dropped charity are unlikely to be shareholders of what I'm assuming is OP's corporate, so the "right" people won't be pissed off by this. This very poor behaviour won't affect their bottom line or the senior bods' bonuses, so sadly zero fucks will be given. I'm not sure ACAS or the Charity Commission will care either?

Move on, OP, you're clearly made of better stuff!

Let’s hope the Daily Mail are on patrol tonight, eh?

What point? The issue isn’t anything to do with the organisation of the event, or the OP’s leave. It is to do with swapping out the charity at the last minute which is disgusting. It isn’t just about “promising the money” either.

Stand firm! The fuckwits!!!

And start looking for another job!

Is there any one more senior at the company you could discuss this with?
Could they do a second event for the second charity later on in the year, say Easter? Even if its just a sponsored fun run or something?

Not very charitable of your company, is it.

Definitely stand your ground- but jobs are hard to come by, and you need to be sure if you walk, you can afford to.

in your position I would be highlighting:

• the optics and potential negative publicity (do NOT say that it will come from you. This will likely contravene NDAs in your contract about business sensitive info)
• the tangible benefit the chosen charity will receive- ask the question - are they willing to pull the plug on X,Y,Z - refer to the case studies
• that your company will at least be obligated to reimburse the charity you’ve been working with for any outlay they have made, including loss of time- literally every hour counts in fundraising, if they’ve been working with you, they’ve “lost” out somewhere else
• that if despite all of this they go forward with the new charity, you will not breaking the news to your charity without a senior manager on the call, to answer questions, and make it clear you won’t dig them out of their hole

I aggree with this.

Do check the list of trustees on the Charity Commission's website. Bet there's a friend or family member there.

Wildly unethical, not in the spirit of fundraising. But as someone who works in the sector - sadly it's not unheard of for companies to suddenly pull out after promising money. I imagine the new charity is something more fashionable or seasonal like breast cancer or a Christmas toy appeal, and the original one is something less 'fun' like a women's shelter?

You know what would be truly charitable? Giving money with no strings attached, no requirement to spend it on anything specific, no convenient tax break, no PR, no charity needing to report back on how they used the money, no charity staff time required.