Tell us what you think about the Mumsnet Flendr platform for group money collection - £300 Love2Shop voucher to win!

[PoppyMumsnet]

We're on the hunt for MNers to test Mumsnet Flendr, an online platform for organising cash collections and fundraising activities.

The idea is to make it easier to do things like club together for a joint birthday present, collect for a teachers' end-of-year gift, or fundraise for something you care about. All lovely activities, but they often involve some fairly tedious money admin too.

So, if you've ever found yourself stuffing crumpled fivers into envelopes - or having an awkward ‘Er, could give me that money you promised’ conversation with a late payer, then we're hoping Mumsnet Flendr will help.

It's really easy to set up a collection, and people who pledge to chip in get auto-reminders. Contributors can make payments by PayPal, payment card or bank transfer, and organisers get alerts when there's a contribution. And unlike some other big fundraising platforms, all your money will go to your chosen cause, with no hidden charges or fees.

If you’re interested in testing Mumsnet Flendr, please click here to sign up.

If selected, we'll send you login details for the beta version and you can tell ell us what you think of the website and the collection process – all feedback gratefully received!

As a further thank you for being a tester, MN Flendr have agreed to contribute £10 to all collections above £30 with more than 3 contributors e.g. if you start a collection for a teacher's present, and get a combined total of £30 or more from 3 different people, Mumsnet Flendr will add £10 to your collection!

All testers will be entered into a prize draw where one winner will receive a £300 Love2Shop voucher.

Many thanks and good luck!

MNHQ

Standard T&Cs apply

What collections do you intend to use the platform for? Flendr would like to negotiate special discounts especially for you with leading retailers.

A combined birthday pressie fund. Amazon?

What other features would you like from a collection platform?

I agree re complete transparency. Also agree platform for anonymous donations. (tracker knows who donated what but it does not show amount to others if the donator prefers anonymity).

What collections do you intend to use the platform for?
I would use it for work collections for birthdays, new babies, leaving gifts. Also for a holiday fund - 20 of us go away together and all chip in for a kitty for the week.

Flendr would like to negotiate special discounts especially for you with leading retailers.
I would appreciate the larger companies, ie Amazon, Etsy, Major Supermarkets.

What other features would you like from a collection platform?
A kind/gentle reminder system for those who are the usual late payers. And I agree with the anonymity for people.

Dear MN - not wanting to sound impatient or anything but when are the emails due to be sent out? I need to get going on my collection presto pronto!!

TIA

I have been picked as a tester and I will be using it to collect for a friend of mine who is pregnant and due to give birth soon. Looking forward to trying this out and seeing how I get on.

I think the next event I'll need collections for is September - is that too late to be a tester?

Tester here - thinking to test it with my daughter, who is raising money for a trip to Zambia with the School. She has to fundraise for it, and it'd be great to have a place that family and friends can contribute to. Hope that will work!

I'm so glad i've been picked as a tester. I'm not sure about discounts from retailers as i'm raising for a charity.

Name idea's
Raise It
Feelgoodfund

Hopefully there will be easy options for donations, paypal especially. Can't wait to get fundraising for my charity 'Pounds for Poundies'.

Looking forward to trying this out. I would use it for work collections and family collections for gifts and holidays.

Reminders and regular balance checks are a must.

I've been picked as a tester, I will be using Flendr to collect money for the charity I work for. I'm not sure what else I would like from this sort of platform, I'll have to use it and see.

What collections do you intend to use the platform for? Flendr would like to negotiate special discounts especially for you with leading retailers.
End of year collections for DCs' teachers and clubbing together with family members for a family birthday.

What other features would you like from a collection platform?
Easy way of collecting money, and potential to be transparent. Easy withdrawal of the funds. Easy ways to tell people about the collection.

I'd like to do a collection around to get group tickets for Alton towers, chessington, Thorpe park etc (maybe with Tesco vouchers too)

I've set up my fundraising page already, shared it on FB, and had a donation from a family friend who wouldn't have been able to contribute in cash as they're too far away.
A good start to a long Fundraiser (more than £500 over a year)but it proves it works.
I'd like a facility to add a link to the description field, as the link I added (to the event we're fundraising for) shows up as text.

Just to clarify, I'm raising £500, that wasn't the first donation! My friends are nowhere near that rich!

I've just registered at Flendr and really liked the choices available for heading up what the collection is for (mine is 'gift'). I also like the privacy settings (good for collections that need it). Only gripe so far is that I'd like to be able to put a PayPal link, rather than full account details, but it's not the end of the world.
I've emailed the people who usually do the collection and hope they agree to using Flendr!

Thanks for fixing the link issue, the fundraising is continuing well, 1/4 of the total raised already!

Completely ignore my PayPal gripe, I've actually set up bank details (now the OK has been given by the reps) and realised people can pay by payment card, bank transfer or PayPal - which it actually says on the Flendr site oops, obviously I didn't read the blurb properly!

we did our collection (we are just a few friends collecting for a gift for another friend going through a rough patch). So, now that we're done and the campaign has "expired", what happens now? Should I be waiting before withdrawing to get this £10 bonus? I would like to have the "whole" amount together to go and get her something nice

On use - I found it easy to set up. My friends did find it a little cumbersome to use: I had it on private initially and when I sent out the link it wasn't immediately obvious where the password for it was. I then made it public (friend was unlikely to be looking for it, so a minimal risk of her finding it) to obviate that problem, but for the future it could be better set out.

I'm guessing there is a cost to Flendr if people use their cards, but there was some grumbling about the fee for that - not everyone has a paypal account, and setting up a bank transfer can also be a bit cumbersome. My bank, for example, wants me to use a card reader to set up new transferees, so it wouldn't be something I could do on the go.

Did those of you who collected already get a link then? Or did it all by yourself?

yes bluetinkerbell I was sent an email on 25/4

Hmm strange I didn't get one

Was intending on using it for my tandem skydive I'm doing to collect money for Sands in honour of my second daughter Sterre 5th birthday this June.

Ok, so I don't like it that they automatically send you the money. I had started a collection with a £10 target as I didn't want to set any target, it went over that amount and the collection date hasn't finished yet, they've already transferred the money over...

I didn't have much luck with my Flendr test. Unfortunately friends didn't want to use that to transfer money to me which I was collecting for a group holiday deposit. They preferred to use their usual method of transferring money which is via bank transfer.

Thankyou for choosing me to product test anyway. I'll keep it in mind for the future if I ever have to collect money in for anything.

So as I checked no possibility anymore to start new collections.

Also the £10 reward promised, was this only for collections? Or also for fundraising?