GuideStar UK preview on hold to improve login
Howard Lake | 7 September 2005 | News
Charity information site GuideStar UK yesterday began a month’s pre-launch preview for charities before the site is launched publicly. However, responses within the first day from over 200 charities made it clear that the site’s registration and login procedure needed to be improved, so the preview is currently on hold until 22 September 2005.
GuideStar UK apologises for the delay, but thanks the charities who explored the preview for their prompt and constructive feedback.
A GuideStar spokesperson said: “feedback from charities is an important function of this preview, which is part of our continuous consultation process.”
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GuideStar UK will offer what it claims to be “the most comprehensive web-based encyclopaedia of registered charities in England and Wales.”
The charity wrote to all 167,000 charities featured on the website giving them each a unique password that wouldl allow them to view their entry and add to it.
Password holders who logged in on the first day will have seen information about their charity’s activities and finances, extracted verbatim from documents filed with the Charity Commission. They would also have found a guide showing them how to add, if they wished, logos, links, information about achievements and future campaigns, newsletters and press releases.
Before the preview was put on hold, Erica Roberts, GuideStar UK’s chief executive, said: “this preview will contribute to ensuring that the site when it goes public is as good as possible.”
There is no deadline: the option to update the entry on the website will remain for charities to use whenever they wish.
Roberts says that the government-funded website, a free resource for charities and visitors to the site, will attract 1.6 million visitors in its first year.
Funding for the site included a grant in March 2003 of £2.9m over 3 years from HM Treasury’s Invest to Save Budget, and grants from charitable trusts including The Weston Foundation, The Community Fund, Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors, The Bulldog Trust, and The Dulverton Trust, as well as from individual philanthropists.
About Howard Lake
Howard Lake is consultant editor of UK Fundraising. He founded the site in 1994 and successfully sold it in 2022. As director of Giving X Ltd he is exploring growing giving on a massive scale.
He is the founder of Fundraising Camp and co-founder of GoodJobs.