To think some charity shop volunteers are exploited and should be paid?

[34degreesburningbees]

There's a young man with autism at my local (chain) charity shop and he works so hard - harder than I ever did when I worked in retail. He sees it as his full time job and they work him like it is one.

He has been there for years. It seems a bit, idk, exploitative.

AIBU?

I volunteer in a 2 charity shops as a retiree. We have a number of younger volunteers who work almost full time in the various shops. They all have some issues. However they do far better volunteering in a charity shop as they are effectively paid by the State in benefits and are treated very well.

Compare that to a minimum wage job working as a delivery driver or the like, where they are put under pressure by managers.

So effectively the state is paying the wages of some of the unpaid staff.

I’ve had the same training as you. I’ve also done First Aid at Work training too.

The thing about volunteering is it’s so much more flexible than paid work. If he needs to leave, he can, if he needs a month off he can have it, if he wants to change days they’ll do that, if he’s rude to a customer then it’s just a volunteer they can’t reprimand etc. He won’t need to reach targets or be put under pressure to make sales.

It’s a completely different sector.

So assuming governance covers the salary of the CEO, the charity gets £16mil a year?

It’s not even about percentage. It’s about value for money.

I used to be involved in a local section of a national charity and saw then the fraud even at local level. When someone embezzles a high five figure sum and nobody does anything about it, it kinds of puts you off donating.

Add to that evidence that their actions were in direct contravention of their supposed values - just no. And in case anyone thinks I dont know what I am talking about, I saw it first hand

That's not charity shops - they are actually managed and run by the specific charities.

You are thinking of the donation-begging plastic bag through the door lot, who say all profits go to Charity X on their blurb. They are totally independent commercial businesses.

Exactly

Don’t let’s forget that many charity shop volunteers run businesses of their own and are able to take the best of the stock, eg. clothing , china for a pittance , to resell.
I’m not saying everyone does this but it stops me from donating anything valuable to a charity shop. I know that a volunteer will walk away with it for a pound or two.
I say this because I’ve had charity shop staff say as much to me and my DMIL used to do this, not as a business but look out for good stuff for the family.

Yes totally agree with you op but it's not so much the shop doing the exploiting as society that won't give young people with learning difficulties and other types of disabilities a chance. Many of these young men and women would make excellent employees being hard working and conscientious and having a range of other skills, but no one wants to employ them. It's very sad and leaves them relying on volunteer jobs to get any kind of meaningful work. At least the charity shop gives them a chance to contribute to society.

My adult daughter has a moderate learning disability- IQ of 56. I can categorically tell you it DOES prevent her from working. She has even been let go from volunteering roles - two hospitals and two charity shops - as her supervision requirements are too high and left to her own devices she gets confused and misunderstands easily and basically cannot be left. I have had people tell me she can work and it is really infuriating as they don't understand her difficulties.

You can work on PIP?

Yes. You can. Obviously if you say eg you can't walk and then take a job as a post man, that would get you into a lot of trouble. But you could be in a wheelchair, say, and do a desk job. Pip is there to cover the additional costs of having a disability. People on PIP are encouraged to work.

I work full time and receive pip...a disability may prevent someone being able to work but being in receipt of pip isnt an issue in itself.

I know, that’s why I was confused that the poster I quoted was looking for voluntary posts.

You can work and get pip. It's not either/or.

Yes despite what the Jeremy Vine show says!

Agreed and in fact, I would never ever buy from or donate to Cancer Research UK as a result of this. I worked there as a young volunteer but it wasn’t me I was worried about.

They treated their store manager like crap and paid him £10k per year but he was expected to drive sales and be creative with initiates. He did so much overtime and got absolutely zero for it. The regional manager constantly complained about poor sales despite the store being dependent on donations.

Sadly, I think this kind of exploitation is common in the charity sector.

I don’t believe ‘many’ charity shop workers do this. I have volunteered since 2020 and am so fed up of the charity shop volunteer bashing on mumsnet. Either we are all daft old biddies who don’t know the difference between primarni and Armani or we are thieves..

Some charities are actually informally providing “respite”. The volunteer with special needs goes and do just a few tasks of the long list they would be required to do if they were paid staff, and they would very rarely work more than a few hours a week. That gives them some routine and sense of purpose but it also allows the relatives/carers to have some time on their own to deal with stuff they cannot do when the person is around.

Most charities would like for their volunteers to use the experience to get the skills to progress onto paid employment (and vacate the space for other people who may benefit from the experience). Those who stay for a long time might not be able to get into paid employment either because the disability makes it impossible to meet most of the points in a job description or because the individual is not able to deal with the pressure.

I can quite appreciate you disliking the talk about the ‘perks’ of the job if you don’t do it yourself.
I happen to collect old china and going round local charity shops and chatting to staff about some of the things, they would casually mention that the manageress was a dealer or that they all had special areas they dealt in. They weren’t embarrassed about it at all but it was quite an eye opener to me.
Btw, a pp spoke about the massive level of theft that goes on by staff in Charity Shops.
I think it’s one of those unpalatable facts.
And yes, all the people I’m thinking of were indeed old biddies.
I’m one too. 😆

I think what a lot of people don't get who don't manage volunteers is the work required in actually managing volunteers. There's recruitment, interviewing, training, coming up with incentives, scheduling, checking in, supervising. Then there's the personalised care and attention required - everyone volunteers for a different reason, and have different needs and interests - i.e., skills building ahead of paid work, wanting to practice English, wanting to socialise etc. Some will want to do certain tasks but not others.

You have to balance these capabilities and interests with the needs of the "business" (as it were). This can be really tricky - in this instance, there's someone with ASD, which will dictate who can be rota'd with him in terms of being able to take the lead/buddy and support most likely. There will be risk assessments and PEEPs. Volunteering can be brilliant for people with disabilities, provided this is facilitated safely and thoughtfully.

It drives me bananas when people assume getting volunteers to do something is an easy short cut.

Has the heat got to you? You are talking to yourself 😂

One of my local charity shops had a load of books donated, and one was rare. Sold for £900. They have volunteers dedicated to e-commerce, so the more expensive bits go online.

I like uranium glass, but have only ever found one item.

Yes, it’s definitely a challenging role managing volunteers. Much more difficult than managing paid staff imo.

I’m a volunteer for BHF, we have a manager, assistant manager and two part time retail assistants. None are massively highly paid, I think it’s tougher than ordinary retail, even carting the huge number of bags upstairs for sorting is very physically demanding. I’m very supportive of our managers, they do their best to make the shop attractive, and we have lots of regular customers.

I’m retired, been there years, and seen a lot of changes, one is identifying valuable items which go online, those profits are rising. Volunteers are people like me, retired, or younger unemployed or students. We have volunteers with disabilities, the support our managers give them is good. Some like working behind the scenes, others wish to serve the public face to face, and develop their customer service skills. We all have our reasons for volunteering, the 25% discount on any items we buy isn’t at the top of my list!

The turnover last year was over £230million IIRC. I would think the CEO’s pay would be commensurate.

@Anarchy99

Charities need to offer those kinds of salaries to CEOs as if they didn't, they wouldn't get the people with the necessary skills, knowledge and experience to do the job properly/competently.

If they offered a 60k salary (which would be unfairly low, considering the level of responsibility) the people best suited and best qualified for the job simply would not apply. They would look for work in the business sector where they could earn a lot more.

Which means the people who would apply would not be the best suited for the job. They wouldn't have the level of skills and knowledge that other potential candidates (who are put off by the low salary) have.

The charity will lose a lot more money if it is run by someone incompetent and inefficient than it "loses" spent on a decent salary. A high salary is an investment and one that generally pays off.

And just because the organisation is a charity, that does not mean that its paid staff should be paid any less than market rate for their work.

@SixtySomething

Perhaps that happens in some shops, but at Oxfam, the staff have to pay the full price for anything we wish to buy. We're certainly not getting items on the cheap, and there isn't even a staff discount - we pay the exact same price as another customer would.

A couple of my own purchases from the bookshop I volunteer in have been for £40 and £50. And those were for single books, not a collection.