Charity shops getting stupid with prices
- Thread starter Retro6
- Start date
I don't need them. I only sell on ebay anyway.
If this isn’t infringing on MM rules, what’s your eBay username so I can keep an eye out?I don't need them. I only sell on ebay anyway.
@montymint tagging you for clarification,and openness, in case this is some kind of breach? - he’s not advertising anything as of yet nor has he access to the MM…
If this isn’t infringing on MM rules, what’s your eBay username so I can keep an eye out?
@montymint tagging you for clarification,and openness, in case this is some kind of breach? - he’s not advertising anything as of yet nor has he access to the MM…
nah if you buy on ebay as far as I'm aware has nothing to do with the forums and the Dons / Admins won't get involved if things go squiffy.
Thanks, I appreciate the clarification.
I pretty much always round it up and give the extra to charity. Why not? If you don't want to do it, don't, but it's much more convenient for me to press the 'yes' button rather than donate 73p every week to a charity. If my weekly shop is £60 then it's not much of an extra. There's also at least one begger outside my local Tesco and he always seems to have a good supply of sandwiches and drinks. Though I dare say he'd rather have a few cans! I've never seem him moved on. I think people are generally more compassionate than you are.
When you see the things I've seen, that compassion disappears very quickly, trust me. Those little round up buttons are just an easy hassle-free way for supermarkets to tick that charity box at best, and a blatant exploit of a tax loophole at worst. I'm not even starting on the charity themselves, odds are it's just another faceless organization that rakes in everyone's round ups and occasionally throws the poor a bone to ensure their legal obligations are met.
Utter scum, all of them.
You’ve ranted about charity before, why not whistleblow and give some real examples?
Regardless, I don’t care if it’s a tax dodge, or if not all the money actually goes to someone in need, something is better than nothing and I’d rather they’d have a bone than not.
I should probably do a nice long post with all that information in it so I can reference it tbh.
It's a bit of a journey, so here are a few highlights:
A Ford dealer gave a charity a few cars a few years ago. Mondeos and Focuses mainly, so they could be used as prizes in fund raisers. The cars were raffled off in an internal event that raised diddly squat for their cause. Now one might say that the staff also require incentives to keep their morale up, something I wholeheartedly agree with, however this was just the tip of the iceberg. In the three years I maintained the building, I don't think a single staff member paid for their Christmas gifts for their kids, and some even took a load of toys to sell on ebay. One was even caught doing it and was given a verbal caution rather than immediately being sacked for gross misconduct. Every year around October they'd start a massive toy collection event which would then be donated to orphans and kids' hospitals and whatnot. I donated a few toys the first year, one of which was those old-school army soldiers that I used to love as a kid. This was a pretty unique toy as it came from South Africa yet I saw someone walk out with it in her arms less than a week after I'd donated it. Turns out that all the toys went in to this room where they were sorted by age, girls/boys, etc. The staff would then go in, take whatever they wanted, and the leftovers were donated. Both of these were a massive charity. I won't name them directly, but they support cancer research.
I also looked after a building which had quite a few mickey-mouse charities in it, one was for water sources for rural villages in Somalia. I'd happily go on record saying that less than 5% of what was donated was actually sent to Africa. Every Friday was a massive pissup in the office, they ordered take-aways every day, they lived like absolute kings off the money that the likes of you and I donated. Same thing with a "donkey sanctuary" (lol).
Of course once their reputation was ruined with me I started getting a lot more cynical with them, which hasn't let me down yet. My wife donated some money to some or other charity about 5-6 years ago, not realising that it was a recurring direct debit. When I noticed this we cancelled the DD and they spent, no jokes, the next three years pestering us with bleeding heart letters about how these poor kids in Africa are starving. We moved, but I wouldn't be surprised if they are still sending their pity-party letters.
Look at the hawkers on the streets of London. I'll never forget my first experience with one, outside Moorgate station. Grabbing some lunch, as I did every day, one of them approaches me and asks me for a donation. Fair enough, I hand her a fiver and walk on. "No sorry sir, we can't take cash, can you fill out this form?" which I took one look at and said no. It was of course on an iPad and the form was a direct debit permission thingy starting at a tenner a month. Right before the crash in 2008. I told her no and she followed me for another hundred yards basically begging. This wasn't someone looking to raise money for charity, this is someone working on commission who's now losing out. They're still around the City, I see them every single day. Packs of them, like rabid hyenas, pestering anyone who looks weak enough to fall for their guff and sign on the dotted line. I have to be rather firm with them some times too, telling them in rather colourful language to leave me alone as I'm not interested. I now just tell them that they have a higher chance of winning the national lottery and the euromillions on the same day than they do of getting any money out of me and they tend to leave me alone. Or do the headphones trick, that works wonders too.
Like the postal harrassment above, what do you think the costs are for these people on the streets? They're not volunteers - I can tell you that much. And the weekly begging letters? Assuming these are sent to a few thousand people, at least once a month, what does this cost? I understand that to make money you need to spend money, but as a charity even an idiot like me could tell them that this money is pure waste. If someone's cancelled their direct debit and hasn't responded in a few months, they're not renewing. Period. But no, keep posting those letters.
Then there are the places that the "aid" goes to. Firstly, Africa has had absolutely billions upon billions pumped in to it over the decades, and there's no improvement. There have been countless projects that managed to miss all the nonsense above and actually deliver on the front lines. Schools, wells, clean water systems, hospitals, the lot. You know what happens? The stuff gets left to rot at best, or nicked and harvested for its materials at worst. Africans aren't interested, they want to be left alone to their own devices. Want some visual proof of what I'm talking about?
Here, watch these:
Clothes:
Computers:
Want some more?
Abandoned school built in 2013, now used as toilets and shelter for miscreants.
School built by Madonna abandoned, to be turned in to cemetery
Tens of thousands of boorholes left to rot in disrepair, quarter of a billion dollars wasted
Oxfam staff paying for prostitutes
I could go on and on. Now let me be clear: I'm not against helping those less fortunate than myself. I do it all the time, and do it with a smile on my face. What I can't stand is people abusing the plight of others for their own personal gain. Last time I had any decent help with charitable causes, my wife and I helped at a local Afghan refugee centre helping women who were pregnant and or vulnerable who had fled Afghanistan.
The next one I'll be doing is to help Ukranian refugees, we're just in the process of sorting it all out.
Phew, that turned in to a bit of a speech. I'll reference this one if anyone ever asks me again
@Diddums - I shan’t quote the post because it’s long (that’s not a bad thing!).
I think you’re right though, there is an awful lot of misuse of funds and bad management. The car trader sounds more like the bad guy than the charity though. And as someone in the car trade, I’m not surprised!
Many of these schemes like the rounding up are certainly done to make the business look better to an extent but it’s also done with some goodwill behind it. My work contribute to a local cancer charity, and I’m sure they are getting something back but it’s still a good thing.
Chuggers/bleeding heart letters/etc no doubt have a cost benefit or they wouldn’t be done. Surely if they manage to raise £100 but pay out £80 in costs it’s still a good thing.
I don’t get the hostility to chuggers, they say hi, I say no thanks and that’s it. No need to be rude to someone trying to make a living imo. But, I wouldn’t ever donate to them.
For full disclosure I regularly donate to the RNLI and Prostate Charities. I do this direct and I’m sure there may lots of waste but hey, better than nothing! But yes, there’s huge amount of exploitation in the charity sector but I don’t think that’s a reason to not engage with it.
Kudos for writing a good post though! And I’ll watch the videos at some point.
As a famous shop once said, every little helps!
I think you’re right though, there is an awful lot of misuse of funds and bad management. The car trader sounds more like the bad guy than the charity though. And as someone in the car trade, I’m not surprised!
Many of these schemes like the rounding up are certainly done to make the business look better to an extent but it’s also done with some goodwill behind it. My work contribute to a local cancer charity, and I’m sure they are getting something back but it’s still a good thing.
Chuggers/bleeding heart letters/etc no doubt have a cost benefit or they wouldn’t be done. Surely if they manage to raise £100 but pay out £80 in costs it’s still a good thing.
I don’t get the hostility to chuggers, they say hi, I say no thanks and that’s it. No need to be rude to someone trying to make a living imo. But, I wouldn’t ever donate to them.
For full disclosure I regularly donate to the RNLI and Prostate Charities. I do this direct and I’m sure there may lots of waste but hey, better than nothing! But yes, there’s huge amount of exploitation in the charity sector but I don’t think that’s a reason to not engage with it.
Kudos for writing a good post though! And I’ll watch the videos at some point.
As a famous shop once said, every little helps!
Absolutely this....
Permabanned
- Joined
- 9 Aug 2008
- Posts
- 35,711
The shops are there to help people with little money. They not there for people to turn profits. It doesn't stop people doing it though. One of the problems is a lot of charity shops CEOs are taking the big cut.