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 the charity knew this they’d (rightly) be pretty disappointed in her.

But how can it be claimed that spending £22k (which could have been used for charitable purposes) to raise £3k is in anyway cost effective and good practice. I perhaps should have pointed out that the £3k.was the total amount raised all year. So they raised a total of £25k and the costs of the events to do so was £22k...if that was a business you'd have to question their set up

As a further aside there appear to be no social media and the Web site is a year out of date, but they are still fund raising

My general rule is "adults no, kids yes." That's flexible. If an adult is doing something especially unusual/grand, or it touches a nerve with me personally, then I will make an exception. Most recently was back in May when my mum had just been released from hospital after a very sudden and quite serious health scare, I was driving her home from a nurse appointment and we saw a bloke walking down the street wearing a decorated bath tub. I think he was raising money for a kids mental health charity. He appeared in the local news and I chucked him a tenner, mostly to thank the universe for my mums return to health.
But someone doing yet another 5K run for breast cancer? Nope.

When it comes to kids, I'll give my cousins kid a tenner to do something charitable in the local area, but your 18yo who wants to go help "build homes in Africa"? Fuck off.

I’ve sponsored friends and families kids etc, it’s only a couple of ££ and they appreciate it. But I don’t usually sponsor adults, as previously said those that are doing activities they want can pay for themselves (and extra for the charity). As for the ones that run/walk round in circles seems pretty pointless, if you seriously want to help another group/charity then do something with community meaning. Why not organise sponsored group litter picking, gardening, decorating, visiting, graffiti cleaning, food kitchen etc……

Potentially both, TY78910 - but then I've experienced both, the second one much more frequently

As I mentioned, charity has become an industry, and while of course I appreciate that large scale operations require most input, it also brings unwelcome aspects wich to my mind are better avoided

the donations are all online & once the charity has your details you can be harassed for years!

That's why the suggested donations will often be something odd like £8 a mont, @MermaidMummy06

As an acquaintance involved in this explained, they'll very quickly call asking that donors raise it to £15, and if that's resisted ask for "just £10" on the assumption thhe giver will then feel they've "got a bargain"

It's the same age old sales technique of first offering someting likely to be refused, on the basis that few like saying no twice, and for watever reason it works