Ploink! microdonations service to be free for one year
Howard Lake | 18 January 2013 | News
Microdonations service ploink! is to suspend its fees for 2013 as a gesture of goodwill.
The site, launched in 2009, has helped pioneer microdonations in the UK. It functions as an online charity collection box, enabling people to donate small amounts of money to their chosen charities using a debit card, credit card or a PayPal account.
Donors can choose to give pennies or pounds to their favourite charities by dragging and dropping virtual coins into charity ‘piggy banks’. When the coins saved into a piggy bank add up to 99 pence or more, the money can be donated.
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Ploink works with over 450 UK charities including BeatBullying, Kidney Research UK, Make-A-Wish Foundation UK, The Meningitis Trust and World Vision UK.
"Up to £200 a month more" for charities
Ploink normally deducts 10% from a donation plus ten pence to cover transaction costs and for the promotion of charities using its service. Waiving its fees for a year should add up to £200 each month to the amount that charities receive through its website.
Why free?
Marc Simpson, Director of Ploink, explained why fees were being waived. He said: "Last year was difficult for charities large and small and we were keen to do our bit to give them a boost as the new year gets underway. At a time when people are giving less and charities are feeling the squeeze Ploink wants to help buck the trend by giving people a fun and flexible way to donate. I hope that by suspending our fees, more will be encouraged to give in the knowledge that every penny and pound will be going straight to the causes that need them most."
The Lymphoma Association's Director of Fundraising Alice Strudwick has used Ploink. She said: "As a small charity reliant on voluntary income, we’re always encouraging our supporters to collect their loose change, as every penny counts. Ploink works like an online version of our loose change collection boxes and we’ve enjoyed promoting this new fundraising mechanism to donors.
"We now have 38 supporters on our Ploink page and have raised over £360 so far. We receive an excellent service from the Ploink team and benefit from the extra awareness they bring our charity by promoting our work to their thousands of Twitter followers. We would encourage any charity to sign up."
www.ploink.co.uk
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.