# Online donations outstrip phone gifts by US donors to Asian appeal

- Link: https://fundraising.co.uk/2004/12/30/online-donations-outstrip-phone-gifts-us-donors-asian-appeal/
- Published: 2004-12-30T00:00:00+00:00
- Author: Howard Lake

Americans are more likely to give online to the Asian floods emergency appeals than
via the telephone.
Writing at MSN.com, Jerry Markon and Leef Smith, report that “
online donations to the [American] Red Cross outstripped traditional phone banks
by more than 2 to 1.” Specifically, by Tuesday 28 December, 25,000 people had made
online donations to the American Red Cross, compared to 9,000 people donating via
the emergency phone hotline during.

 

 

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Visitors and donors accessed the Catholic Relief Services Web site in such numbers
that the site crashed.

 

 

AOL (America Online) published details of how to help the relief effort on its front
page to its millions of subscribers. At the same time it donated $200,000 to the
American Red Cross and pledged to match the first $50,000 that AOL employees give.

 

 

By the end of 29 December, the Los Angeles-based humanitarian relief and development
agency International Medical Corps said that a substantial proportion of the $160,000
that it had raised had been donated via its Web site. This included a single donation
of $5,000.

 

 * **[Rapid public response internationally to Asian floods appeals](https://fundraising.co.uk/2004/12/31/rapid-public-response-internationally-asian-floods-appeals/)**(
   31 December 2004)
 * **[DEC appeal reaches £60 million](https://fundraising.co.uk/2005/01/01/dec-appeal-reaches-60-million/)**(
   1 January 2005)
 * **[Guardian Christmas Appeal passes £500,000](https://fundraising.co.uk/2005/01/01/guardian-christmas-appeal-passes-500000/)**(
   1 January 2005)