Aggregated External News

President Clinton and Chelsea Clinton just wrapped up a day of traveling in Lilongwe, Malawi – the first stop on their journey through Africa to visit Clinton Foundation projects on the ground.

On July 31- August 8, President Bill Clinton and Chelsea Clinton will travel to Africa to visit Clinton Foundation projects in Malawi, Zambia, Tanzania (including Zanzibar), Rwanda, and South Africa. This trip, and the projects visited, will highlight many of the issues that President and Chelsea Clinton have long worked on — economic growth and empowerment, equality of opportunity, and health access.

Fifteen years ago, in 1998, President Clinton first traveled to Africa as President. This was the longest and most extensive trip to the continent made by a sitting American president, and was the first time a sitting president traveled to each of his six destinations. President Clinton’s trip followed a seminal visit that Chelsea and then-First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton made the year before. Since their initial trips, President and Chelsea Clinton have continued to build upon their longstanding commitment to Africa through the work of the Clinton Foundation, providing investment, opportunity, and health access to underserved communities. In July 2012, both President and Chelsea Clinton traveled to Africa to visit Clinton Foundation sites in South Africa, Mozambique, Rwanda, and Uganda, and in October 2012, Chelsea visited Nigeria for the launch of the Nigerian government’s Save One Million Lives Initiative to reduce child mortality.

More: http://www.looktothestars.org/news/10580-bill-and-chelsea-clinton-visit-africa

A social enterprise that taps into the hidden world of online sales referrals allows us to give to charity without opening our wallets

Would you donate more to charity if it wasn't coming out of your pocket? Thanks to the combination of several technologies and services, this is now possible through the social enterprise TheGivingMachine.

Every year, online shops pay hundreds of millions of pounds to other websites for sales referrals. This is a hidden pool of money to which we have all added by clicking on a link, buying a product and as a result unknowingly created a sales commission for someone else. TheGivingMachine taps into this established technique called affiliate marketing and enables you to generate a sales commission from buying what you were already going to buy from hundreds of the best known online shops. 75% of these commissions are then converted into free donations to the charities and schools you choose, with the remainder providing the income needed to operate the website and distribute the many donation payments every month.

The mature affiliate marketing platforms enable us to track commissions generated at hundreds of shops back to the user who generated them. By knowing the schools and charities users support (up to four in any percentage split), the donations can all be tracked and distributed correctly. For example, for every £100 spent online, between £2.50 to £5 in free donations is generated and donated to causes the user chooses.

This form of giving has some other interesting outcomes. First, the shopper can choose where to donate. Second, shops now see this type of giving has become a powerful engagement mechanism. Finally, charities and schools can develop a free and regular source of new unrestricted income by simply asking supporters for a small change in behaviour rather than directly "ask" for more money.

Our team, many of whom are parents who work between school drop-off and pick-up, have a very dynamic working environment which has a mixture of home working and community space working. Thankfully, there is a huge array of technologies that enable us to provide a professional service while keeping costs low.

Website, phone lines, email, document and issue management systems are all hosted on cloud platforms, which means we can easily cope with demand increases because all our data can be accessed, managed and amended from wherever we are. Team and board meetings around kitchen tables are as effective (perhaps more so) than around office desks.

Why is being a not-for-profit social enterprise important? Enabling you to generate free donations and manage the thousands of payments every month to charities and schools across the UK is a privilege and is driven primarily by our social purpose and outcome. Being awarded the social enterprise mark means that we join the many other social enterprises who are transforming commerce into a force for good for our communities and beyond.

In 2012, more than 17,000 new givers joined TheGivingMachine (that's more than 1,300 a month) and helped generate more than 220,000 donations that year. We hope to exceed a million free donations generated by the end of 2013.

Richard Morris is the founder and managing director of TheGivingMachine

This content is brought to you by Guardian Professional. To join the Guardian Social Enterprise Network, click here.

• Innovation
• Social enterprise blog
• Social enterprises
• Charities
• Voluntary sector

A social enterprise that taps into the hidden world of online sales referrals allows us to give to charity without opening our wallets

Would you donate more to charity if it wasn't coming out of your pocket? Thanks to the combination of several technologies and services, this is now possible through the social enterprise TheGivingMachine.

Every year, online shops pay hundreds of millions of pounds to other websites for sales referrals. This is a hidden pool of money to which we have all added by clicking on a link, buying a product and as a result unknowingly created a sales commission for someone else. TheGivingMachine taps into this established technique called affiliate marketing and enables you to generate a sales commission from buying what you were already going to buy from hundreds of the best known online shops. 75% of these commissions are then converted into free donations to the charities and schools you choose, with the remainder providing the income needed to operate the website and distribute the many donation payments every month.

The mature affiliate marketing platforms enable us to track commissions generated at hundreds of shops back to the user who generated them. By knowing the schools and charities users support (up to four in any percentage split), the donations can all be tracked and distributed correctly. For example, for every £100 spent online, between £2.50 to £5 in free donations is generated and donated to causes the user chooses.

This form of giving has some other interesting outcomes. First, the shopper can choose where to donate. Second, shops now see this type of giving has become a powerful engagement mechanism. Finally, charities and schools can develop a free and regular source of new unrestricted income by simply asking supporters for a small change in behaviour rather than directly "ask" for more money.

Our team, many of whom are parents who work between school drop-off and pick-up, have a very dynamic working environment which has a mixture of home working and community space working. Thankfully, there is a huge array of technologies that enable us to provide a professional service while keeping costs low.

Website, phone lines, email, document and issue management systems are all hosted on cloud platforms, which means we can easily cope with demand increases because all our data can be accessed, managed and amended from wherever we are. Team and board meetings around kitchen tables are as effective (perhaps more so) than around office desks.

Why is being a not-for-profit social enterprise important? Enabling you to generate free donations and manage the thousands of payments every month to charities and schools across the UK is a privilege and is driven primarily by our social purpose and outcome. Being awarded the social enterprise mark means that we join the many other social enterprises who are transforming commerce into a force for good for our communities and beyond.

In 2012, more than 17,000 new givers joined TheGivingMachine (that's more than 1,300 a month) and helped generate more than 220,000 donations that year. We hope to exceed a million free donations generated by the end of 2013.

Richard Morris is the founder and managing director of TheGivingMachine

This content is brought to you by Guardian Professional. To join the Guardian Social Enterprise Network, click here.

• Innovation
• Social enterprise blog
• Social enterprises
• Charities
• Voluntary sector

(Credit: United Way, Source: Peter Panepento/The Chronicle of Philanthropy)

Social media is a fantastic tool to make your presence known online. But are you using it correctly? Many nonprofits are using it to promote themselves, but often in the wrong ways, said Peter Panepento, assistant managing editor at The Chronicle of Philanthropy, at the Washington, DC, edition of the Social Media for Nonprofits conference. He often sees nonprofits tweeting links to press releases or posting them on their Facebook page, trying to hijack their social media pages as an “official communication channel.”

“Don’t use social media to be bureaucratic,” Peter told the conference. Social media is the perfect tool for PR, but only when the emphasis is on   personal. Nonprofits should put a human face on everything and use social media to humanize your organization.” “You don’t need a big budget or to be particularly photogenic,” Peter said, you just need to be human. Here are three rules we learned from Peter on how to humanize your social media and tell a great story:

1. Think like a reporter.

Use your social media accounts to feature someone in your community that your group engages with such as donors, beneficiaries of your work, and local businesses that support you. Seek out someone that can answer the question, “Who cares? Why should this matter to me?” Remember that stories are about people, so feature the people who matter to your cause.

2. Share your #fail.

In 2010, the organization charity: water posted on Facebook for its September Campaign Live Drill. From Central African Republic, they produced a live broadcast when they attempted to drill for clean water-and failed. Peter highlighted charity: water because instead of trying to hide that something went wrong, they made it public, even writing a blog post about it. For every success, there is failure. “Followers really responded to seeing things that don’t work, you seem more genuine to your followers.”

3. Give your supporters the megaphone.

Think about how your supporters can help tell your story over social media. Invite them to talk about your work just like the United Way did for their 160th anniversary (as seen above). You can even encourage volunteers to be reporters by rewarding them: retweet them, call them out, and thank them. If you bake it into the volunteer experience, Peter said, “you’ll get more genuine language from people than you could otherwise compose.”

For better social media engagement, follow these tips from Peter to humanize your organization. “If you can show the work that you’re doing and the people you’re serving, even if it’s not in a mud pit somewhere in Alaska but at your desk, that can be really helpful.”

The Social Media for Nonprofits conference is coming to Austin, TX on August 13, 2013. Check out the conference agenda, and follow SM4Nonprofits on Facebook for the latest updates. Heading to Austin? Use our “N4G” discount code to save $20.

That’s not a typo. Hispanic women are the growing powerhouse of consumer spending in the US. Not only are their numbers and buying power increasing dramatically, Hispanic women seem to call the shots when money decisions are made within the typical Hispanic household. [Of course, my wife says that's just a continuation of a long-established tradition that most men of any stripe haven't yet realized. "Ignorance is bliss" she says.] According to this new report from Nielsen, Latina Power Shift, with 52 million in the US population, Hispanics have an impressive buying power of $1.2 trillion. Says Nielsen, “Within

Just as in soccer, for breast cancer the best defense is a strong offense. Because of this, the Instituto Arte de Viver Bem (IAVB – ‘The Art of Living Well Institute’) has selected soccer star Neymar Jr., of Barcelona and Brazil’s national team, for a perfect play: to appear in the middle of Times Square and serve as an inspiration in this fight.

The aim of the campaign, created by the VML agency, is to underscore the importance of regular visits to the doctor, mammographies and getting exercise, which can help in prevention of the disease or recovery for those who are in treatment.

More: http://www.looktothestars.org/news/10579-neymar-kicks-off-breast-cancer-campaign

Charity Commission investigating concerns of possible fraud relating to £450,000 donation

Comic Relief has called in Charity Commission investigators over concerns of possible fraud relating to a £450,000 donation to a Ugandan charity.

It is understood up to £200,000 of the donation, given by the British public via Comic Relief to the Ugandan charity the Busoga Association UK, is unaccounted for or is the subject of possible abuse.

It is alleged that £50,000 of the grant was used to pay for consultants to make the bid for a donation from Comic Relief – an extremely high amount for such consultancy work, according to those familiar with the case.

The charity, which is registered in the UK with the commission, says on its website that it works in Britain and Uganda to provide support to men, women and children, including helping women living in urban slums in northern Uganda. Hundreds of thousands of pounds in grants given by other organisations are also being reviewed by the regulator as part of a check on its finance and governance.

The revelations come at a time when the Charity Commission is under political pressure to improve the detection of fraud. The parliamentary public accounts committee has begun an inquiry into whether the commission is fit for purpose.

Margaret Hodge, who chairs the committee, has said the commission's approach to regulation and enforcement lacks rigour.

This summer, the national fraud authority estimated that UK charities had lost £147.3m of public donations to fraudulent activity in the financial year 2011-12.

The Charity Commission confirmed on Thursday it was examining concerns raised by Comic Relief auditors over the Busoga Association UK. But nearly three months on from first being alerted by Comic Relief about donations which are unaccounted for, the regulator has yet to make a decision on whether to use its statutory powers to mount a formal investigation.

A spokeswoman said: "The commission has been approached by Comic Relief expressing concern about funding it has provided to the Busoga Association UK (1081149) on the basis that insufficient accounting records have been made available to confirm how the grants were applied.

"The commission has sought a meeting with the trustees of the charity to discuss what evidence exists concerning the use of the funds in question, together with the charity's governance and financial management arrangements. Before that meeting, the commission has not formed a view of what the outcome will be in terms of any regulatory advice or action."

The commission refused to say whether the police had been alerted over possible fraud or whether any contact had been established with Busoga's trustees.

A Comic Relief spokeswoman said: "do not comment on cases prior to outcome."She said the charity, which has made more than £800m worth of grants since 1985, pursued any abuse of its funding vigorously.

"We constantly review our systems and draw on expertise from external advisors to ensure our funds go where they are most needed and are used by organisations to make real change in people's lives," she said.

The Guardian made repeated attempts to contact the Busoga Association UK, which is based in Dalston, north-east London, but there was no response.

Two months ago, the National Fraud Authority revealed that nearly one in 10 UK charities with incomes of more than £100,000 were subject to fraud in the financial year 2011-12. It exposed the failure by many charities to regularly audit donations – only a fifth of the charities who responded to the fraud survey said they tried to measure their fraud loss each year. Nearly 25,000 UK charities failed to complete the fraud audit.

The chief executive of the Charity Commission, Sam Younger, responding to the NFA report, said charities had to embrace a culture of counter fraud and risk management.

The public accounts committee said in June that the Charity Commission had failed to detect widescale abuse by a charity called Cup Trust, which received £176m in income but made donations of just £55,000.

Questioning whether the regulator was "fit for purpose" Hodge said the episode had caused "damage to the reputation of the commission and charity sector". She added: "The Charity Commission's approach to regulation and enforcement lacks rigour."

• Charities
• Uganda
• Africa
• Voluntary sector

Charity Commission investigating concerns of possible fraud relating to £450,000 donation

Comic Relief has called in Charity Commission investigators over concerns of possible fraud relating to a £450,000 donation to a Ugandan charity.

It is understood up to £200,000 of the donation, given by the British public via Comic Relief to the Ugandan charity the Busoga Association UK, is unaccounted for or is the subject of possible abuse.

It is alleged that £50,000 of the grant was used to pay for consultants to make the bid for a donation from Comic Relief – an extremely high amount for such consultancy work, according to those familiar with the case.

The charity, which is registered in the UK with the commission, says on its website that it works in Britain and Uganda to provide support to men, women and children, including helping women living in urban slums in northern Uganda. Hundreds of thousands of pounds in grants given by other organisations are also being reviewed by the regulator as part of a check on its finance and governance.

The revelations come at a time when the Charity Commission is under political pressure to improve the detection of fraud. The parliamentary public accounts committee has begun an inquiry into whether the commission is fit for purpose.

Margaret Hodge, who chairs the committee, has said the commission's approach to regulation and enforcement lacks rigour.

This summer, the national fraud authority estimated that UK charities had lost £147.3m of public donations to fraudulent activity in the financial year 2011-12.

The Charity Commission confirmed on Thursday it was examining concerns raised by Comic Relief auditors over the Busoga Association UK. But nearly three months on from first being alerted by Comic Relief about donations which are unaccounted for, the regulator has yet to make a decision on whether to use its statutory powers to mount a formal investigation.

A spokeswoman said: "The commission has been approached by Comic Relief expressing concern about funding it has provided to the Busoga Association UK (1081149) on the basis that insufficient accounting records have been made available to confirm how the grants were applied.

"The commission has sought a meeting with the trustees of the charity to discuss what evidence exists concerning the use of the funds in question, together with the charity's governance and financial management arrangements. Before that meeting, the commission has not formed a view of what the outcome will be in terms of any regulatory advice or action."

The commission refused to say whether the police had been alerted over possible fraud or whether any contact had been established with Busoga's trustees.

A Comic Relief spokeswoman said: "do not comment on cases prior to outcome."She said the charity, which has made more than £800m worth of grants since 1985, pursued any abuse of its funding vigorously.

"We constantly review our systems and draw on expertise from external advisors to ensure our funds go where they are most needed and are used by organisations to make real change in people's lives," she said.

The Guardian made repeated attempts to contact the Busoga Association UK, which is based in Dalston, north-east London, but there was no response.

Two months ago, the National Fraud Authority revealed that nearly one in 10 UK charities with incomes of more than £100,000 were subject to fraud in the financial year 2011-12. It exposed the failure by many charities to regularly audit donations – only a fifth of the charities who responded to the fraud survey said they tried to measure their fraud loss each year. Nearly 25,000 UK charities failed to complete the fraud audit.

The chief executive of the Charity Commission, Sam Younger, responding to the NFA report, said charities had to embrace a culture of counter fraud and risk management.

The public accounts committee said in June that the Charity Commission had failed to detect widescale abuse by a charity called Cup Trust, which received £176m in income but made donations of just £55,000.

Questioning whether the regulator was "fit for purpose" Hodge said the episode had caused "damage to the reputation of the commission and charity sector". She added: "The Charity Commission's approach to regulation and enforcement lacks rigour."

• Charities
• Uganda
• Africa
• Voluntary sector

The 2013 Young Hollywood Awards, which celebrates the best emerging young talent in film, music and television, has announced that Teen Cancer America is its official charity.

Teen Cancer America assists hospitals nationwide in the development of cancer units designed to give patients ages 13-24 positive physical and emotional outlooks. Cody Simpson, along with Olympic skating gold medalist Tara Lipinski, are two of Teen Cancer America’s celebrity ambassadors and are participating in the Awards show, which will air on Thursday, August 1 from 8 – 10 p.m. ET/PT on the CW Network and will emanate from the Broad Stage in Santa Monica, CA.

More: http://www.looktothestars.org/news/10578-teen-cancer-america-named-as-official-charity-of-young-hollywood-awards

On Saturday, Variety honored Hollywood’s most philanthropic young entertainers at their seventh annual Variety’s Power of Youth event sponsored by Flips Audio at Universal Studios in Los Angeles.

Flips Audio, the first ever headphones that convert to HD speakers, sponsored the star-studded event, produced in conjunction with Variety’s annual Youth Impact Report, and created a “Solo2Social” experience with their first headphone interactive red carpet activation for Variety. Celebrities tested Flips that were suspended from the red carpet wall fixture, and listened to some of their favorite tunes before flipping their headphone cuffs to speakers so guests could hear what they were enjoying.

The event featured an exclusive afternoon of festivities, live performances and an awards presentation. The evening celebrated a select group of outstanding young entertainers, chosen to receive the Variety Power of Youth generationOn Award, who, through their efforts, have made significant contributions to their chosen philanthropic and charitable causes. The guest list was comprised of 500 invite-only guests, made up of the “who’s who” of under-25 actors, actresses and recording artists, industry executives and their families and the children and families directly affected by the honorees’ benefiting charities.

More: http://www.looktothestars.org/news/10577-young-stars-are-honored-for-charity-work-at-power-of-youth-event

Internationally renowned artists, Toto, has joined with The ALS Association to bolster public awareness about amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) during the band’s 2013 North American tour.

In addition, the band members have initiated “Team TOTO,” a nationwide effort to support the Walk to Defeat ALS, The Association’s largest national signature event.

Members of the band have become involved with the cause in honor of TOTO’s bassist Michael Porcaro, who stopped touring with the Grammy-Award winning band in 2007 due to growing numbness in his fingers. He was later diagnosed with ALS, also known as Lou Gehrig’s Disease, which is a progressive neurodegenerative disease that affects nerve cells in the brain and the spinal cord. The disease robs people of the ability to walk, to talk and even blink an eye. It traps them inside a body they no longer can control and ultimately prevents them from breathing as it takes their life. There is no known cause of the disease.

More: http://www.looktothestars.org/news/10576-toto-supports-als-association-on-new-tour

At a keynote presentation earlier this morning, former Vice President Al Gore officially welcomed more than 1500 new members to the Climate Reality Leadership Corps.

As part of his day-long session with attendees, Mr. Gore, the Founder and Chairman of The Climate Reality Project, delivered an updated slideshow presentation first made popular by the award-winning An Inconvenient Truth.

Volunteers from all 50 states and more than 70 countries attended the Climate Reality Project’s twenty-third training program, and participants included teachers and students, academics, lawyers, physicians and nurses, entertainers, homemakers, business leaders, entrepreneurs, public servants, and more. Following the training, Climate Leaders emerge from the program as energized and skilled communicators with the knowledge, tools, and drive to educate diverse communities on the impacts of climate change and to demand action now. Since the program’s inception, Climate Leaders have reached millions of people worldwide through their presentations in their communities.

More: http://www.looktothestars.org/news/10575-al-gore-welcomes-1500-new-climate-leaders

Priyanka Chopra, the award-winning actress and musical artist, announced thos week that she is joining the United Nations Foundation's Girl Up campaign.

In her role as Girl Up Champion, Chopra will help raise awareness and funds for UN programs that provide girls around the world with life-changing opportunities like the chance to go to school, see a doctor and stay safe from violence.

“As a Champion for Girl Up, I am lending my voice to a cause that is very close to me. I come from a country where girls are not treated fairly – many girls are kept out of school, get married at a young age, and don’t have access to health services,” said Chopra. “I am joining Girl Up because I firmly believe in the campaign’s mission, that every girl, no matter where she is born, should grow up safe, healthy and empowered. Every girl should have the opportunity to reach her full potential.”

More: http://www.looktothestars.org/news/10574-priyanka-chopra-joins-girl-up-campaign

The confusing process of claiming Gift Aid hinders the often spontaneous nature of text donations and online giving

Impulse donations have to be quick. A pound in the bucket is easier than a lengthy chat with a clipboard-wielding rep on the street – and the same principle applies to giving via charities' digital channels.

This is why the cumbersome and confusing process of claiming Gift Aid hinders the often spontaneous nature of text donations and online giving. Any attempts to simplify the path to donation must be welcomed.

So it's promising that the Treasury's new consultation, Gift Aid and Digital Giving, recognises that advancements in technology, which are boosting charity fundraising campaigns, are being maimed by antiquated Gift Aid processes.

But the Treasury must go beyond recognising the problems. They must resolve them. The danger is that this promising but piecemeal paper will distract from what should be the highest priority right now: properly implementing the two biggest changes in Gift Aid – online returns and the small donations scheme.

Bringing Gift Aid online has not been without its complications so far, and the Government could be doing more to assist technology companies helping charities transition to the new system by September.

The small donations scheme is a wonderful idea but, in this case, small has not meant simple. The entry-level guidance for this was 20 pages long in explaining the scheme. The key to success of Gift Aid reform is layman simplicity. The proposals to cut the declaration by half is welcomed, although not radical.

For radical we just need to see how defective our tax incentives are in comparison to the US. To seriously boost the giving economy in the UK, we need to seriously shake things up, and this paper is too bland for that, but it could still save millions by streamlining the system.

Simplifying the process for staff, not just supporters, is the crux of this. I have watched conscientious smaller charities, fearfully checking the eligibility of donors for Gift Aid, spending salaried time on administration around it.

Sensible steps to simplify the user experience for Gift Aid declarations are important. We should focus on the donations funnel and making this as short, simple and smooth as possible. It's amazing how easy it is to put someone off giving by asking people for too much detail.

We need to aspire to making the donation experience as painless as ordering from Amazon. For one-click payments, storing Gift Aid status against a donor is critical, whereas other suggestions like a central declaration database seem too far-fetched.

Gift Aid is seen as a huge incentive to boost giving, but Raising IT carried out a simple online experiment, where we removed Gift Aid declarations from a donation form, hence simplifying it, and saw an increase in donations. Gift Aid simply cannot continue to be a barrier to online giving.

JustGiving took advantage of the public's ignorance of Gift Aid, and to many it seemed they could magically make more money from your donation. There is still plenty to be done to educate people about Gift Aid.

The government is essentially offering circa £15m in tax relief through these proposals, so it's vital that the sector as a whole provides full and frank feedback to the consultation. Without a full and forthright response, it may be another two decades before donations reach the top of its agenda again.

Tom Latchford is chief executive of Raising IT.

This content is brought to you by Guardian Professional. To join the voluntary sector network, click here.

• Fundraising
• Voluntary sector network blog
• Voluntary sector
• Charities

The confusing process of claiming Gift Aid hinders the often spontaneous nature of text donations and online giving

Impulse donations have to be quick. A pound in the bucket is easier than a lengthy chat with a clipboard-wielding rep on the street – and the same principle applies to giving via charities' digital channels.

This is why the cumbersome and confusing process of claiming Gift Aid hinders the often spontaneous nature of text donations and online giving. Any attempts to simplify the path to donation must be welcomed.

So it's promising that the Treasury's new consultation, Gift Aid and Digital Giving, recognises that advancements in technology, which are boosting charity fundraising campaigns, are being maimed by antiquated Gift Aid processes.

But the Treasury must go beyond recognising the problems. They must resolve them. The danger is that this promising but piecemeal paper will distract from what should be the highest priority right now: properly implementing the two biggest changes in Gift Aid – online returns and the small donations scheme.

Bringing Gift Aid online has not been without its complications so far, and the Government could be doing more to assist technology companies helping charities transition to the new system by September.

The small donations scheme is a wonderful idea but, in this case, small has not meant simple. The entry-level guidance for this was 20 pages long in explaining the scheme. The key to success of Gift Aid reform is layman simplicity. The proposals to cut the declaration by half is welcomed, although not radical.

For radical we just need to see how defective our tax incentives are in comparison to the US. To seriously boost the giving economy in the UK, we need to seriously shake things up, and this paper is too bland for that, but it could still save millions by streamlining the system.

Simplifying the process for staff, not just supporters, is the crux of this. I have watched conscientious smaller charities, fearfully checking the eligibility of donors for Gift Aid, spending salaried time on administration around it.

Sensible steps to simplify the user experience for Gift Aid declarations are important. We should focus on the donations funnel and making this as short, simple and smooth as possible. It's amazing how easy it is to put someone off giving by asking people for too much detail.

We need to aspire to making the donation experience as painless as ordering from Amazon. For one-click payments, storing Gift Aid status against a donor is critical, whereas other suggestions like a central declaration database seem too far-fetched.

Gift Aid is seen as a huge incentive to boost giving, but Raising IT carried out a simple online experiment, where we removed Gift Aid declarations from a donation form, hence simplifying it, and saw an increase in donations. Gift Aid simply cannot continue to be a barrier to online giving.

JustGiving took advantage of the public's ignorance of Gift Aid, and to many it seemed they could magically make more money from your donation. There is still plenty to be done to educate people about Gift Aid.

The government is essentially offering circa £15m in tax relief through these proposals, so it's vital that the sector as a whole provides full and frank feedback to the consultation. Without a full and forthright response, it may be another two decades before donations reach the top of its agenda again.

Tom Latchford is chief executive of Raising IT.

This content is brought to you by Guardian Professional. To join the voluntary sector network, click here.

• Fundraising
• Voluntary sector network blog
• Voluntary sector
• Charities

Treat, the greeting card service from Shutterfly, Inc., today announced its exclusive Celebrity Birthday Card Collection in collaboration with two very funny and likeable entertainers – actor, producer, writer and director Seth Rogen and television actress Sarah Chalke.

Rogen and Chalke contributed jokes, sentiments and anecdotes for Treat’s customizable cards. With the launch of the new celebrity birthday cards, Treat made a charitable donation in Rogen’s name to Hilarity 4 Charity and in Chalke’s name to Kawasaki Disease Foundation. Treat’s exclusive Celebrity Birthday Card Collection is available online at www.treat.com/celebrity-cards and on Treat’s App for iPhone.

More: http://www.looktothestars.org/news/10573-seth-rogen-collaborates-on-greeting-cards

Stephen Fry, the much-loved comedian, actor and writer joined award winning wildlife artist Pollyanna Pickering to select the winning ticket in her charitable Foundation’s grand prize draw.

More: http://www.looktothestars.org/news/10572-stephen-fry-helps-pick-a-winner-for-charity

Peter Buffett, musician and philanthropist, wrote this piece — The Charitable-Industrial Complex — last week in the NY Times. Much of what he says relates to the programmatic side of what major donors attempt to do and their motivations. For example, he describes “conscience laundering” …

“As more lives and communities are destroyed by the system that creates vast amounts of wealth for the few, the more heroic it sounds to “give back.” It’s what I would call “conscience laundering” — feeling better about accumulating more than any one person could possibly need to live

HowardLake posted a photo: