New Donation App for Charities
30 October 2014 at 9:48 am
A new smartphone application has been developed with the goal of replacing gifts like chocolates or wine with a donation to a charity.
Sydney-based former accountant Barney Gordon, along with Not for Profit GiveEasy, are the brains behind the Gift of Kindness App, which has just gone live.
Gordon said he started working on the App 10 months ago after trying to think of a way to spark more small donations to charitable organisations.
“I was just trying to think of a way to get more people to give money to charities without making them spend more money than they are currently spending,” Gordon said.
The App allows people to select a charity and a donation amount of their choice in lieu of giving a physical gift at an event like a birthday or a dinner party.
The person that they made a donation on behalf of then receives an immediate notification of the charitable gift, as does the chosen charity.
“The idea was for smaller amounts (of money) to be given,” Gordon said.
“When people come to a dinner party they often bring a box of chocolates or a bottle of wine, but most of the time people don’t need those gifts and they might even get thrown out.
“The whole idea of bringing something is because you want to acknowledge them and you don’t want to arrive empty handed.
“It’s often not the gift itself that counts, but the thought behind it.”
Gordon, who has no background in Not for Profits or philanthropy and previously worked as an accountant, said he had spent around $7000 of his own money getting the App developed.
He said around 15 charities had already signed up to receive donations through the App and he hoped it changed the way people gave to their favorite organisations.
“I wanted to create this App because I couldn’t find anything else where people could give a donation on behalf of someone and that other person is notified,” he said.
“It’s really about peer to peer giving and hopefully users will tell other people about it and they will do the same thing.
“In the past if someone wanted to make a donation on behalf of a friend they had to call up the charity who would have to take a credit card payment and then mail out a voucher of some kind.
“Smaller charities just can’t do that for smaller donation amounts. The cost is more than the donation itself.”
The App allows people to make a minimum donation of $10, there is no maximum amount, and all donations can be tax deductible.
More information on the app can be found here.
