Data Protection

DEBRA respects your privacy and will not pass your details on to any third party without your consent. Full details of DEBRA’s Privacy Policy can be found at www.debra.org.uk/privacy-policy.

 

Gift Aid your donation

If you are a UK tax payer we can increase the value of your donation if you choose to opt in to the Gift Aid scheme. For every £1 you give we can reclaim 25p from HMRC (HM Revenue & Customs).

By ticking the Gift Aid box on a donation form for DEBRA you confirm that you want to Gift Aid your donation and any donations you make in the future or have made in the past for years to DEBRA.

You confirm that you are a UK taxpayer and understand that if you pay less Income Tax and/or Capital Gains Tax than the amount of Gift Aid claimed on all your donations in that tax year it is your responsibility to pay any difference.

We claim Gift Aid back from HMRC; this will always be treated as unrestricted funding, even if the original donation is restricted.

Please contact our Gift Aid Team on 01344 771961 if you wish to cancel this declaration, no longer pay sufficient income or capital gains tax or change your name or home address (Gift Aid may only be claimed against a home address).

Gift Aid Declaration

 

Donation policy

Table of contents

• Purpose
• Related documents
• Responsibilities and scope
• Procedures
• Guidelines

 

Purpose

The following guidelines are to help DEBRA to determine which money and support it should and should not accept in order to preserve its reputation. In many cases the very fact that we have a policy will also defuse adverse media attention.

The policy is primarily relevant to corporate donations. In rarer cases it will apply to personal donations by individuals known for their links to certain types of business, and to other offers of help from members of the public.

For the purposes of this policy the term ‘support’ includes funds or support in kind.

 

Related documents

Donation Processing procedures

 

Responsibilities and scope

Ethics

This deals with support that it may be unethical to accept.

Medical products:

• Support from the medical products or service sector is broadly acceptable.
• Any support that is offered on condition of involvement in any of the charity’s care services must be determined by the acceptability of this support to the Charitable Activities Committee.
• Support from the makers of licensed but controversial drugs should be judged on a case by case basis, according to the amount of controversy likely to be caused by accepting support.

Child labour:

Support from companies known for exploiting child labour overseas should be considered on a case by case basis, according to the amount of controversy likely to be caused by accepting support.

Illegal or Immoral Fundraising

1. No support should be accepted that has known to have been raised illegally or that is illegal. Refer to the Director of Fundraising, Director of Finance or Chief Executive if in doubt.
2. DEBRA should make supporters who intend holding public collections, ticket sales or lotteries aware of the need for licences as required by law. DEBRA should not agree to accept the future proceeds of unlicensed public collections, ticket sales or lotteries, where licences are required by law.
3. Funds from licenced lotteries, games of chance, raffles, and The National Lottery are acceptable.
4. Judgement on a case by case basis should be applied where DEBRA is asked to accept funds from unlicensed activities after they have taken place in good faith but in ignorance of the law. This may require the relevant public authorities to be informed retrospectively.
5. Money raised immorally should not be accepted. Judgement should be made on a case by case basis.
6. Funds from the sales of a criminal’s memoirs are not acceptable.

Tainted Donations and Bribery

1. DEBRA should make supporters aware that ‘tainted donations’ are not eligible for higher rate tax relief and that DEBRA would not be able to claim gift aid on any tainted donation. HMRC defines Tainted Donations to be those that fulfil all of the following three criteria:
   • the donation to the charity and arrangements entered into by the donor are connected.
   • the main purpose of entering into the arrangements is for the donor, or someone connected to the donor, to receive a financial advantage directly or indirectly from the charity.
   • the donation is not made by a qualifying charity-owned company or relevant housing provider linked with the charity to which the donation is made.
     Refer to HMRC guidelines if in doubt.
2. DEBRA should not accept donations that could be considered an act of bribery, whereby the donor is looking to influence service provision or procurement of services.

Public Controversy

This deals with support that could be controversial rather than unethical.

Pornography:

• Funds from producers of pornography are not acceptable, including from umbrella companies which include more mainstream operations.

Alcohol:

• Donations, sponsorship or gifts in kind from alcohol producers are acceptable unless they encourage under-age consumption.

The Environment:

• Only in rare cases where public controversy is particularly vociferous would support from companies known for polluting the environment not be acceptable. This should be judged on a case by case basis.
• Support from companies proven to cause terminal illness in the UK through pollution should not be accepted.
• With the above provisos, support from the nuclear fuels industry is acceptable.

Money Laundering:

• DEBRA should exercise caution where donations over £10,000 are offered from persons unknown and where practicable seek to understand their provenance.
• DEBRA does not accept offers of donations for a certain period of time, i.e. free loans after which the capital is returned, unless the Trustees decide that exceptional circumstances warrant such an arrangement.
• DEBRA should record its reasons for accepting or rejecting such donations in writing.

 

Procedures

Procedures for implementing the Acceptability of Donations Policy

Liability and Delegated Authority:

• The Board of Trustees is ultimately responsible in law for the acceptance or rejection of support for DEBRA. The law allows support for a charity to be rejected where it can be reasonably judged that acceptance of such support would damage the core interests of the charity.
• The Finance, Risk and Audit Committee requires to be consulted and the Board must have the final decision where staff propose to turn down support in accordance with this policy.
• The Finance, Risk and Audit Committee requires to be consulted and the Board must have the final decision where staff propose to accept a donation which is not in accordance with this policy.

Return of funds:

• Changes in circumstances of donors may require DEBRA to return monies given up until that time.
• This would not apply to funds received in the past from a company acceptable at the time which is later not deemed to be so.
• This could apply to a sponsorship agreement still in operation when the company sponsoring DEBRA becomes, for example, part of an unacceptable group; whether or not money raised to date should be returned, the agreement should be terminated. Provision should be made for such termination in future sponsorship agreements.

Any return of monies must have the approval of the Chief Executive or Chairman.

 

Guidelines

Debate and Discretion

This policy cannot provide a set of complete and absolutes rules; case by case judgement by the Board of Trustees or by their delegated staff will often be required to interpret these guidelines.