JustGiving

Giving Limited
Just Giving
Limited company
Founded 2000
Founder Dame Zarine Kharas (CEO)[1]
Anne-Marie Huby (managing director)
Headquarters Bankside, London, England, UK
Revenue £14m (2011)[2]
£1.5m (2011)[2]
Number of employees
 160
Website justgiving.com

JustGiving is a global online social platform for giving.[3] The firm's headquarters are located in Bankside, London.

History

In 2000, Zarine Kharas and Anne-Marie Huby founded JustGiving, a company to provide online tools and processing services to enable the collection of charitable donations.[2] The company's website allowed people to donate to charities registered with the site with a credit or debit card online, and offered people doing sponsored events the chance to build their own webpage to collect sponsorship from supporters.

2006 was JustGiving's first profitable year.[4]

In June 2011, JustGiving claimed that it had provided its service for more than 9,000 UK registered charities and 1.9 million fundraising pages for users, collecting over £770 million since launch.[5] The cumulative total passed £1 billion in March 2012.[6]

The cumulative total passed £4 billion in June 2016.[7]

Gift Aid processing

In the UK, donations by individuals are treated as being given after the deduction of income tax at the basic rate (20% in 2011), and charities can reclaim the basic rate income tax paid on the gift from HMRC via Gift Aid.

Charities that register on the JustGiving site complete the necessary legal forms to authorise JustGiving to request the tax from HMRC on the charities' behalf. JustGiving then automates the reclaiming of Gift Aid on individual donations made through its website, and passes this on to the charities. 85% of donations through the site are eligible for Gift Aid tax relief.

Fees

JustGiving charges a 5% fee on donations to cover the cost of running the business.[8] The fee does not include card processing fees, which are deducted additionally.[9]

For donations that are eligible for Gift Aid, the 5% is charged on the reclaimed tax as well as on the original donation, and the fees are deducted only once the claim has been settled by HMRC.

Additionally, charities have to be registered with JustGiving to receive donations. Charity registration required a monthly subscription fee of £15 since 1 April 2002, regardless of whether any donations are made. Since 3 August 2016, charities receiving more than £15,000 per annum £39 a month plus VAT. Charities raising up to £15,000 a month (Gift Aid included) will continue to be charged £15 a month plus VAT.

JustGiving Foundation has a "Use of 'Limited' exemption" status in the UK.[10] This requires it to meet all of the following conditions.[11]

  • It must be a private company limited by guarantee.
  • The company's objects (aims) must be the promotion or regulation of commerce, art, science, education, religion, charity or any profession.
  • The Memorandum and Articles of Association must include clauses that:
  1. . Any profits or other income should be applied to the promotion of the company’s objects.
  2. . Prohibit the payment of dividends, or any return of capital, to the company’s members.
  3. . Each member will contribute to the assets of the company if it is wound up during the time that he or she is a member, or within 1 year of ceasing to be a member.
  4. . In the event of the company being wound up, all company assets will be transferred to another body with similar objects, or which promotes a charity.

JustTextGiving

In May 2011, JustGiving launched JustTextGiving in conjunction with Vodafone, which allows mobile phone user to donate between £1 and £10 to a charity using a SMS message, which is paid for by the donor through reverse SMS billing. Vodafone invested £5 million to ensure that charities do not incur any set-up costs, or commissions deducted from donations, ensuring that they receive 100% of donations.[12][13]

Notable fundraisers

In 2010 Charlie Simpson, aged 7, raised over £210,000 (£145,000 in the first 48 hours) via his JustGiving page for the 2010 Haiti earthquake relief programme by UNICEF.[14]

In April 2012, Claire Squires, who collapsed and died whilst running the London Marathon, posthumously raised in excess of £925,000 for Samaritans through JustGiving (without including Gift Aid).[9] It was determined that she had put a scoop of a product containing dietary supplement Methylhexanamine into her water bottle.[15] JustGiving were to receive £26,000 but agreed to waive their 5% administration fee and donate it to Samaritans.[9]

In March 2014, Christian Smith was killed in a crash with a car during a 24-hour charity bike ride for Mind. Donations via his JustGiving page rose to more than £68,000 after his death was covered in the media.[16]

In April 2014, Stephen Sutton raised over £4.5 million for the Teenage Cancer Trust,[17] after help from celebrity backers including Jason Manford.

Reception

In 2002, JustGiving won the New Media Awards Grand Prix award and also Best Use of the Web award.[18][19]

In 2004, JustGiving was recognised in the 2004 Charity Times annual Awards in their Fundraising & IT Services category. Charity Times claimed the company had "transformed the face of donating in the UK".[20]

Charities Aid Foundation (CAF) reported that JustGiving "was enabling charities to tap Britain's youth with viral marketing and sophisticated processing technology for online donations." They said that the main beneficiaries have been smaller charities, which find donation tracking and fundraising costly.[4]

Corporate affairs

Name

JustGiving is the trading name of Giving Ltd in the UK and Justgiving Inc. in the US.[21]

ReachOut Online Limited was incorporated in November 1999, renamed as ClickForAction.com Limited in March 2000, and renamed again as Giving.com Limited in May 2000.[22]

ClickForAction PLC was incorporated in April 2000, and renamed as Giving Ltd in May 2000.[22]

Ownership

Giving.Com Limited's sole shareholder is Giving Ltd.

First round capital included the venture capital firm Vesta Capital Advisors.

Both Vesta Group Limited and Pollcast APS were investors.

JustGiving was acquired by U.S.-based Blackbaud, Inc. for £95 million in October 2017.[23]

International expansion

In 2003, JustGiving launched in the United States, changing its name to FirstGiving in 2005. FirstGiving is located in Davis Square, Somerville, Massachusetts.

In 2010 the New York Times reported that FirstGiving.com was "among the best known" online fund-raising sites.[24]

Revenue

As at 31 December 2010, as per accounts filed on 30 September 2011, Giving Limited had cash on hand of £5,924,865.[25]

YearRevenueProfit/(loss)Registered charities
2003£273,000[4](£1.043m)[4]
2004£851,000[4](£676,000)[4]
2005£1,900,000[4](£136,000)[4]1,000[26]
2006£3,900,000[4]£815,000[4]
2007££
2008££3,000[4] – 5,000[26]
2009££6,000[26]
2010££
2011££9,000[5]
2012££

Criticism and controversies

In 2008, The Guardian reported Kharas as acknowledging that "the commission charged by justgiving.com is controversial".[4] In justifying their 5% fee, JustGiving states that profits are reinvested in new tools.[9]

In February 2017, JustGiving was reported of taking more than £20 million from fundraisers while paying staff up to £200,000. It takes a cut from most donations and while some of the money is used for maintenance, product development and charity training, accounts show that more than £10 million was spent on staff costs in 2016. This includes an average salary of more than £60,000 for some directors, sales and administration workers, with the boss of the firm having earned approximately £198,000. A charity chief executive had accused JustGiving of being greedy, saying the fees were 'hard to stomach' and fundraisers had expressed their anger, labelling the site 'JustTaking'.[27]

See also

References

  1. ↑ Whittle, Sally (30 May 2002). "Is it a girl thing?". The Guardian. Retrieved 24 November 2012.
  2. 1 2 3 Smithers, Rebecca (6 April 2011). "Charitable giving: BT launches website where 100% of donations go to charity". The Guardian. UK. Retrieved 20 November 2012.
  3. ↑ Walker, Chris. "JustGiving online charity platform arrives in Australia to make donating easier". Daily Telegraph. Australia. Retrieved 19 June 2014.
  4. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 Inman, Phillip (24 March 2008). "Charities go online to stay in the running and reach the next generation of givers – JustGiving.com has dealt with more than £250m in donations since 2001". The Guardian. Retrieved 24 November 2012.
  5. 1 2 "JustGiving...by the numbers". Archived from the original on 30 June 2011. Retrieved 2011-01-10.
  6. ↑ "£1 billion raised through JustGiving". Community pages. JustGiving. 28 March 2012. Archived from the original on 30 March 2012. Retrieved 4 January 2013.
  7. ↑ "JustGiving total raised passes £4 billion". UKFundraising. 15 June 2016. Retrieved 30 June 2016.
  8. ↑ "How our fee works – and what we do for it". JustGiving. 23 July 2014.
  9. 1 2 3 4 Oxlade, Andrew (24 April 2012). "JustGiving agrees to waive its £46,250 cut as marathon death girl's fundraiser page hits £400,000". MailOnline. UK. Retrieved 20 November 2012.
  10. ↑ "Company Category". Justgiving Foundation is a PRI/LBG/NSC (Private, Limited by guarantee, no share capital, use of 'Limited' exemption). Retrieved 11 January 2015.
  11. ↑ "Exemption from using the word 'limited' in a company name". Retrieved 11 January 2015.
  12. ↑ Warman, Matt (9 May 2011). "'New age' of charity donations by text message". The Daily Telegraph.
  13. ↑ "JustGiving and Vodafone launch free text donation service". Fundraising UK. 9 May 2011.
  14. ↑ "London boy raises £145k for Haiti quake aid by cycling". BBC News. 25 January 2010. Retrieved 20 November 2012.
  15. ↑ Squires, Claire (30 January 2013). "Claire Squires inquest: DMAA was factor in marathon runner's death". BBC. UK. Retrieved 1 April 2015.
  16. ↑ "Family of Mind charity cyclist Christian Smith 'moved beyond belief'". BBC News. 25 March 2014. Retrieved 24 November 2014.
  17. ↑ https://www.justgiving.com/Stephen-Sutton-TCT
  18. ↑ "Home". NMA Efficiency Awards 2006. New Media Age. Archived from the original on 23 December 2005. Retrieved 2 March 2012. ... early Grand Prix winners including ... JustGiving in 2002
  19. ↑ "Home". Nmaawards.co.uk. Retrieved 14 March 2011.
  20. ↑ "UK Charity Awards 2004 winners". Charitytimes.com. Archived from the original on 3 February 2007. Retrieved 2 March 2012.
  21. ↑ "justgiving.com Site Overview". Alexa.com. Retrieved 4 January 2013.
  22. 1 2 "WebCHeck – Select and access Company Information". companieshouse.gov.uk. Retrieved 4 January 2013.
  23. ↑ "Blackbaud completes its £95m takeover of JustGiving". Retrieved 2018-04-19.
  24. ↑ Wallace, Amy (5 September 2010). "Online Giving Meets Social Networking". The New York Times. Retrieved 29 November 2012.
  25. ↑ "Giving Limited 2010 account". bizzy.co.uk. Retrieved 24 April 2011.
  26. 1 2 3 "Who we are". Archived from the original on 16 April 2009. Retrieved 2013-01-04.
  27. ↑ Willgress, Lydia (7 February 2017). "JustGiving accused of taking £20m from donations while paying staff up to £200,000". The Telegraph. Retrieved 5 September 2018.
  • "JustGiving". Website. JustGiving.
  • "JustGiving". Projects. Peldon Rose Group.
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