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Authenticity of International Help Organizations?

Posted by Cliff on from the are-they-legit dept.

UlfJack wonders: "I've been thinking about donating money, especially to organizations like Plan USA, who are doing what they can to help people in Third World countries. However I found it very difficult to check the authenticity of these organizations, so I'm trying to cross-check multiple independent sources. Has anyone figured out an easy way to do this?"

21 of 66 comments (clear)

  1. Trusted recommendations.. by greenpanda · · Score: 2, Informative

    I only donate to whom the BBC recommend.

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    PHP
  2. other ways to help by same_old_story · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Of course giving money can make a difference.

    But there are other ways to help (specially if you are an american citzen).

    One great way is to make sure you vote / pressure you legislators / presidents towards broader / better foreing policy. For example, Brazil has held long disputes with the wto for the usa to stop anti competitive measures, such as heavy agricultural subsidies. There is much talk about open economies, but many developed countries put a lot of barries for third world countries to make a fair competition.

  3. Simple. by tod_miller · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Go to av.com, google.com, amazon.com and look for the organisation that they recommend.

    Basically, trust comes not through computing, but through inplied trust.

    You trust google to know which companies to link to.

    Of course, a centralised website should exist that gives an easy API for charities to take donations, give feedback, be accountable and of course, this should be government run, and be worldwide, and have the IRS (the only people you can really trust when it comes ot money, and by IRS I mean the inland revenue of your country) poking at it with a big stick.

    that is my opinion. for now, look at av.com and donate to thier link button.

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    1. Re:Simple. by tod_miller · · Score: 2, Insightful

      You could use google pagerank for plan usa, plan usa has a link to give.org... you could google both of these and find out if a larger company is linking to them (amazon or bbc).

      There you go. Don't forget, always donate anonymously and in private, why advertise your generosity, that is like buying a service, rather than donating charitably.

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    2. Re:Simple. by JohnFluxx · · Score: 2, Interesting

      What's wrong with "buying a service" instead?
      Just because you want to help others doesn't mean you can't help yourself as well. Consider all the aid workers that get paid to do their work.

  4. using popular services by boeserjavamann · · Score: 2, Insightful

    living in germany, i always check back websites of popular newsservices or tv-stations to see if they are listed (e.g. at the horrible tsunami disaster)

  5. CBF certification by RogerWilco · · Score: 4, Informative

    In the Netherlands we have the CBF certificate program
    http://www.cbf.nl/ (in dutch)
    http://www.cbf.nl/pages/cbf-erkende_goede_ doelen/m et_cbf-keur.php
    gives a list in Dutch of certified organisations.

    One of their criteria is that overhead costs for advertizing, organisation, etcetera should be less that 25% of the average last 3 years collected funds. I think this limit is a little high, but it gives a valid criterium.

    A lot of USA based organisations fail this test. Certified organisations are Amnesty Internantional, Greenpeace, Medecins sans Frontieres (Artsen zonder grenzen), OXFAM (NOVIB), UNICEF, WarChild, WWF (WNF), Red Cross.

    Furthermore you could look at how and who forms the board of directors, income of the director, publicly available financial information. Stuff that can give you cues about accountability.

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    RogerWilco the Adventurous Janitor
    1. Re:CBF certification by RogerWilco · · Score: 2, Informative

      I would like to add that a lot of USA based organisations have large (> 50%) overhead cost because of advertizing and management. I have been told Foster Parents Plan is one of them. It spends most of it's resources on giving their contributers the idea that they are helping.

      Your Plan USA seems a similar organisation.

      --
      RogerWilco the Adventurous Janitor
    2. Re:CBF certification by RogerWilco · · Score: 3, Informative

      I found a list of overhead percentages here:
      http://www.karthick.com/relief.html

      --
      RogerWilco the Adventurous Janitor
  6. What also bothers me by fozzmeister · · Score: 2, Insightful

    is how much of the money you give actually gets to the intended cause, my guess for a standard high profile charity (oxfam et al) would be somewhere between 40% - 60% (although this may be well off). As for those people who just walk upto you in the street for some random charity i've never heard of, i'd never give to those.

    Really I think charities should be made to publish this information, it surely could be a charity and pay its President most of the contributions, providing the "charity" didn't make money

    1. Re:What also bothers me by ApharmdB · · Score: 2, Insightful

      At least in the US, I believe charities ARE required to publish this information. If it isn't a requirement then apparently a lot of them are doing it voluntarily. Go the Red Cross, UNICEF, or Doctor's without Borders web pages and you can find their budgets. The information tends to be in their press centers. Doctors without Borders is 85.67% towards program services. Management is small at 1.92% and fundraising is the other 12.41%.
      http://www.doctorswithoutborders.org/dona te/info.s html

      So your assumptions and guesses are incorrect and are quickly disproven by looking at the charities' web sites.

    2. Re:What also bothers me by Arcane_Rhino · · Score: 2, Interesting
      Even with their overhead, Médecins Sans Frontières (Doctors without Borders) does fantastic work.

      They were also the only (at least the only that I heard of) charity that publicly announced when they had received enough for the Tsunami effort. Though they took a lot of heat for this announcement from other charities, their spokesman indicated that people had to be confident that the organization's integrity was beyond reproach.

      I found this very impressive and it encouraged me to donate to them for other causes.

  7. Banks do this.... by hughk · · Score: 2, Informative
    all the time because Charities are regarded as high-risk from the point of view of anti-money-laundering. Non-Profit Organisations are considered a little dodgy because the audit reuirements are usually looser than corporations.

    A charity must be registered somewhere. The registrar should have a website with a list of real registered charities. That should be checked.

    A search on the net is also useful to pull out any press records, both good and bad about them. Banks do this too, to ascertain whether the charity is genuine or not.

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    1. Re:Banks do this.... by AndroidCat · · Score: 2, Informative
      A charity must be registered somewhere.

      Aye, there's the rub. There's a pseudo-religious organization that operates in the UK as an Australian charity under a reciprocal tax agreement. (Their charity application was turned down in England, Wales, and probably Scotland in 1999.) They slide between the cracks in the laws of both countries that way.

      Groups with a dodgy off-shore charity registration should be looked at closely before donating.

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  8. Re:Third World Countries...BAH! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    What exactly makes your neighbors more deserving of your help than my neighbors? (Besides the fact that they have to put up with a xenophobic bigot such as you in their community?) What you're talking about is only a little less self-centered than someone saying that he'll only help his friends, or his family, or himself. Thank God most Americans have a better grasp of what charity is.

  9. Well, I'm working for one... by goowaka · · Score: 2, Funny

    I'm currently working for Geekcorps Mali. So I can say they're authentic :) You could donate to Geekcorps (sorry for the asp link, here in Mali proprietary software users are put away in the basement, and we're even developing a free software distro, Kunnafonix...). I'm also setting up a side project: getting more resources in Mali's most spoken language, Bambara. So I came up with the idea to kick start the Bambara Wikipedia, with the help of gadgets you geeks forgot about long time ago (one month ago when you bought your new iPod..) See http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Bambara_Wikipedia_L aunch_Competition (hopefully online right now :)

  10. Re:Third World Countries...BAH! by mmkkbb · · Score: 2, Insightful

    What's really sad is that the original comment is at +2 Insightful. :(

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    -mkb
  11. charity watch by Moe+Taxes · · Score: 2

    I saw this site http://www.charitywatch.org/ on ABC news. They review the tax returns of charities and rank them by how efficiently they are run.

    --
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  12. Yes, word of mouth by leonbrooks · · Score: 2, Informative

    I donate through ADRA and AsianAid, since I know from being told by people who've been there, helped out and looked around that not only is 100% of your money is spent on the front lines (the cost of running these organisations is drawn from money donated by others specifically for the purpose) but the methods they use to help people lean heavily towards (re)establishing self-supporting independence.

    It's not a dependency-forming handout they bring, it's a future.

    If you know of others sticking to similar methods, please list them in reply.

    --
    Got time? Spend some of it coding or testing
  13. Google for $ORGANIZATION fraud by nixman99 · · Score: 2, Interesting

    or complaints, investigation, etc. This gives you a good idea of how much negativity they generate.

  14. Charity ratings website url by DaoudaW · · Score: 2, Informative

    I don't know how to post on slashdot, my husband usually reads it, not me. However, I'm the one with experience in development (fund-raising) and have seen places where charities are rated according to what percent of their income they spend on themselves - for fund-raising, salaries, etc. The url below lists charities that spend less than $25 for every $100, this is considered pretty good! Worth magazine puts out a rating of the top 100 charities in Dec of every year, but I was unable to access the article without subscribing to their on-line magazine, as does the Chronicle of Philanthropy - also by subscription only. These are very good sources of info on charities if you're willing to subscribe or go to the library to find a hard copy, otherwise, check out the website below. Cookie http://www.charitywatch.org/toprated.html#intrelie f