How to choose a charity to support

There are thousands of charities out there who you could give your money to. A question I get asked is, when you want to make a personal donation, how on earth do you choose?

At one extreme, very wealthy donors can call upon the services of a team of specialists to help them with the tax implications, manage donor-advised funds or create their strategic giving programme. At the other end of the scale your friend asks for sponsorship and you hand over £5 or £10 because it’s them. Who they are fundraising for is probably secondary to supporting a friend.

But there is a big range in the middle where making a decision is more considered but you don’t have the back-up of professional advice. Perhaps you don’t want gifts for a big birthday and want to name a charity instead. Or you want to include a gift in your will. Or you are deciding which charity to run the marathon in aid of. It is easy to pick the usual big brand charities but there are lots of great, smaller charities out there where your donation could make a bigger difference. To find them try one of the tools out there like CharityChoice, GuideStar, Charity Navigator, Localgiving.

But how do you know if they are any good? It’s my job to work out which charities should be funded and this involves desk-based research, assessment interviews, scrutinising accounts and panel discussions. I don’t recommend you do all that before parting with £50, but here are five quick things you can do to reassure yourself that your money will be well used:

1. Check out the charity’s website – this should at least let you know they are active and is likely to include case studies about the difference they make. It may also show if they are members of any professional bodies or hold any quality marks.
2. See who else has funded them – if they’ve had money from say Comic Relief or the Big Lottery Fund recently then you can rest assured that a professional assessor has had a good look at them.
3. Consider keeping it local – there are 51 Community Foundations in the UK who pool donations to fund local projects. Again, all checked by them as part of the grant giving process.
4. Look your chosen charity up on the Charity Commission website. You may not want to read all their accounts but there is an overview page that will tell you how big they are and if they have reported as they should and on time.
5. Ask around – friends, family and colleagues may well know of a charity that really supported them or someone they know when they needed help.

There are some brilliant charities out there who don’t have money for high profile marketing so it pays to dig a little to give you the confidence to give to charities which aren’t necessarily the household names.

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