Do you sponsor people for charity?

[Tapoopoo]

I decided a long time ago to not sponsor people eg charity sky dives.

If I sponsor one person I have to sponsor everyone.
I dont always agree with the charities and sonetimes actively dont want to support them.
Limited funds.
Why should I pay for someone to have a jolly? If they want to jump out of a plane, then they should pay for it.
I have seen a few people get quite aggressive/guilt trippy when people say no.
I have tried to fund raise once. The same people I have sponsored in the past were not intetested. I ended up paying most of the sponsorship myself, which I genuinely don't mind (see previous point) but it did stick in my throat.
When I made this decision I had a couple of charity DDs set up. I dont now. I do still give to charity ad hoc.
If I'm honest, I just dont want to. I dont like being asked for money.

I now manage a large number of staff, some of whom are serial fund raisers. I still don't sponsor them (luckily they have never asked me directly and I think they've realised I don't). My staff know I earn about £6000 more than them.

My manager has criticised me for this and thinks I should sponsor them. They sponsor them about £10 a go. They do this for optics, not because they necessarily support what they are doing. If I'd sponsored them at £10 a go, so far I'd have spent at least £120 this year (that I know of).

YABU - you should support your staff. Dont be so mean, it's for charity.
YANBU - you shouldnt be guilt tripped into donating money if you dont want to.

If they're funding their own activity and all sponsor money goes to charity yes.

If they're using sponsor money to fund a fun trip or an exciting activity like sky diving then only giving money left over to charity, no.

Generally I don’t but depends on the person and charity.

It's up to you what you do but not all sponsored events are jollies.

I've survived cancer in the last 12 months and I'm so glad to be alive I'm doing a sponsored run to raise money for a charity relevant to my cancer.

There are a couple of reasons I'm doing it. The first is because I'm genuinely grateful for the medical research that has saved my life and I want to give something back and the second is to set myself a challenge and be part of a positive event alongside other people living with cancer.

I've paid the entry fee myself so all the proceeds will go to my chosen charity.

No. The comedian John Finnimore did a sketch on radio 4 about it... asking to be sponsored to lie on the beach!

There is a charity local to me who one year spent £22,000 to raise £25,000...I can't see that they actually do much in regard to the stipulated aims of the charity that costs much money. In fact I can't find much information about the things they do charity wise anywhere. But the fund raisers seem to have a great time. They recently changed the way they report their accounts to the charity commission to conseal the spend. But looking back on previous accounts it's clearly still happening. Most of their social media is about raising money and nothing about obtaining the help from the charity

Charities have been hit really hard recently as a result of government policy and this thread makes it evident that there is so much misunderstanding around fundraising that their tough times will go on.

For reference, if you give money, you are not funding 'a jolly' or a 'walk from a to b' or a 'mountain climb'. You are supporting a charity which desperately needs cash. The person that goes on the jolly/walk/mountain climb is doing it to both raise money and awareness, (and in part to counter the stupidity of people who think they're doing it for 'a jolly').

It makes me so angry to see people proactively being negative about something as wonderful and important as charity by sharing such ill-informed views. Please think before you type!

I sponsor people if it is something they wouldn’t necessarily enjoy and / or genuinely challenges them. I have a rule that I never give to animal charities.

My cousin weighs over 25 stone. I sponsored them to do a 5k. Another cousin runs marathons regularly so I’d never sponsor him to run 5k

I don't tend to generally (there have been some exceptions) and I am comfortable with that as I have several standing orders and direct debits which mean I donate to my chosen charities regularly.
However I don't mind people doing these thing, and asking, as there are lots of people who will donate and that millions of £s get raised for great causes that way. Lots of people don't have standing orders or direct debits but will respond if asked directly to support a cause / sponsor someone, so that's a win win. More funding raised, in whatever way they can.

You mean like to pay for their hobbies or trips abroad? Or trips in the UK? Fuck, no. I support charities directly, but only with cash - I don't do direct debits, etc. I walk into charity shops and stuff their donation boxes with cash, once a month. I allocate an amount and that is it. Plus the church, also into a donations box.

I ignore the ones that are basically a holiday for the fundraiser with the leftover after expenses going to the charity. The one exception I made was for a close friend who was doing one for a significant birthday and I counted it as her present.

I hate it too. My pet peeves:
-Mainly at supermarkets but charities wanting a regular, monthly DD rather than the loose change I could give there and then
-An online donation where the person can see the amount I've personally donated
-A person doing an event which is a normal daily thing such as walking 10,000 steps a day, and no, they don't disabilities or reason they can't do this anyways!

I used to sponsor people / buy raffle tickets etc - anyone who asked at work.
Then I asked for sponsorship for my dd once who was doing a school fundraiser for cancer research six months after my mum finished successful cancer treatment.
The people who I’d donated to ignored me completely.
so I don’t sponsor any more because of total lack of reciprocation

Nope. Money's too hard to earn to give it away for the sake of optics. If it's not something you genuinely want to donate to, you shouldn't feel guilted into doing it, regardless of your income. There are many 'worthy causes', but there's also a great deal of waste and corruption among charities, and I've come the point that I resent being asked to part with my earnings.

That isn't a cost effective way to donate for the charity. It's much better to pay directly to their bank account as otherwise they've got to organise someone to collect the donation box, count the cash and go and pay it into their bank. It's possible the cost of processing the donation will be more than it's worth unless that task is being done by volunteers.

It is not ok for your manager or anybody else to dictate generosity to you. No need to explain or apologise. Just say no thank you.

Always if it a great charity and I know the person, why be so tight. One of my staff did a abseil to raise funds for a local hospice as her daughter was supported there for the end of her life, it was a very important cause.

if someone is just having a jolly then no.

If I’m asked to sponsor something like voluntourism or a skydive - definitely no.

I tend to donate to my chosen charity directly.

Catch me on a Friday night after a few drinks and I'm much more likely to sponsor people!

I do, but it depends on the person and what they’re doing. I wouldn’t donate for a skydive unless it was my closest friend. It’s generally only £20 or so and if it’s for a good cause, that’s fine

Also, you can gift aid so the charity gets more money.

Although we once went to a stately home type place and were charged extra because we ticked the gift aid box. We tried to explain how gift aid worked (ie we dont pay extra) but the lady wasn't having any of it so we gave up and just paid the extra. Was quite a bit as well! 🤣 I wonder whether anyone ever got her to understand it?

I had this with gift aid when visiting a castle once. Peed me right off! I too tried to explain gift aid but to no avail!

I work for a charity, and obviously think that donations are important.

However, on a personal level, my preference is ethical buying. Buying clothes, food etc with an ethical supply chain is, really, a better route of charity than most support models.

So I don't donate - I just try to make purchases that improve people's lives. Sometimes that is organic low mileage food, sometimes it's buying an overpriced cake at an independent shop that might otherwise close.

My parents donate a lot to charity, but won't spend a penny in their local community.

Yeah, but sometimes you are funding a jolly under the guise of charity.

I wanted to run GNR. I didnt get a place so had to go down the charity place route. TBH I wasn't bothered about what charity, I just wanted to do the race. I paid the "sponsorship" completely myself. That was absolutely a jolly for me and if I had asked for sponsorship, it would have been to enable me to do sonething I wanted to do. I was doing it because I wanted to do the GNR. The charity was an aside.

I also know someone who always wanted to abseil off a specific building. He found a charity who was doing it, like me he didnt care what charity, he just wanted to abseil. Unlike me, he did ask for sponsorship. So the people who were sponsoring him, were paying for him to go on a jolly because that is what it was about for him. They were paying his costs, not donating to charity.

I remember reading that Pretty Muddy barely makes any money from their races.

Very often, it IS a jolly, though. Notice how people usually do enjoyable fun things and they never seem to want to be sponsored to scrub toilets or pick up litter.

If people are paying ALL of the costs of the experience, so that every penny in sponsorship goes to the charity, that's different; but an awful lot of people seem to think that the stated minimum that they have to raise is just the amount that the charity wants to make from each participant, rather than the actual break-even cost of their experience before the charity gets anything.

Well at least we ticked the gift aid box so they'll get gift aid on the entry fee and gift aid on the "gift aid" we were charged. 🤣

I dont get it though, if they do think it's just an extra donation people pay, don't they wonder why it's such an odd figure?