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Institute of Fundraising urges charities to blow the whistle on 'poor' direct mail

By Mathew Little, Third Sector, 27 May 2009

Campaign launched after charities minister Kevin Brennan warns of an erosion of public confidence

The Institute of Fundraising is appealing to its members to blow the whistle on examples of direct mail that contravene the strengthened code of practice it issued last year.

A circular sent to the umbrella body's 5,000 members last week urges them to inform the institute, anonymously if they wish, about "poor" mail campaigns - particularly those that enclose incentives that have little relevance to the cause or rely on guilt to provoke a response.

The move follows a meeting between institute leaders and third sector minister Kevin Brennan. The minister had told the institute he was concerned that bad direct mail could erode public confidence in charities. It is understood that a number of MPs have raised the issue with him.

Louise Richards, the institute's director of policy and campaigns, said it decided to take action after the Fundraising Standards Board's annual review revealed that 19,600 out of 26,300 complaints from the public last year were about direct mail.

A panel of experts will assess submitted campaigns against the code, which also discourages inappropriate shock tactics and over-frequent mailings. The institute is considering imposing sanctions on charities deemed to have breached the code,
including publishing their names and making complaints to the FRSB.

Alistair McLean, chief executive of the FRSB, said many breaches of the direct mail code were by organisations that were not members of the institute or the FRSB. "It is essential that the fundraising sector gets a grasp on the scope and nature of this problem, and to do that we need a project of the type the institute has initiated," he said.

Brennan said he had met officials from both the institute and the FRSB to seek reassurance that decisive action to eradicate bad practice was being taken.

"It was a positive meeting, and I will continue to take an interest until the matter is resolved," he said.

Mick Aldridge, chief executive of the Public Fundraising Regulatory Association, said the institute's plan sent out mixed messages. "The institute is often saying that fundraising is fine - if it's fine, why does it have to set up a whistleblowing service?"

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One Small Voice?, 26 May 2009, 09:12

This whole line about 'relying on guilt to provoke a response' is ridiculous. If copy writers and DM practioners are really honest with themselves then they hope that their appeals will tug on the heart strings. A key part of what determines success (or otherwise) is whether or not the reader is bothered about what will happen if he or she doesn't dig into their pocket. It's pyschology, it's sales, it's life. I wish we'd all get over it and move on.

[Report this post]

Tim Craig, 26 May 2009, 10:52

Consider the environment in your fund raising if you are using direct mail as the medium.

My company Veridata Chester provides a specialist automated, quick turn around service for processing Returned and Undelivered Mail. This is the penultimate piece of the jigsaw for anyone sends out large mailings, catalogues, etc. and helps comply with PAS2020 and Sustainable Mail while addressing the issue of the corporate responsibility of using direct mail.

Our service saves customers, money, protects brand image, mitigates fraud, and reduces their carbon footprint – we recycle all waste paper locally.

Returned, unwanted and undelivered mail is a waste of money, time and effort, which can increase opportunities for identity theft and produces vast amounts of waste paper – 80% of the carbon footprint for a piece of direct mail is in the ‘end of life’.

The ‘end of life’ solution for Direct Mail is still often neglected but with new EU directives on waste paper going to landfill and the DMA PAS2020 regulations there is now a ‘producer responsibility’ that all waste paper generated is disposed of responsibly.

Since 1996 Veridata in Chester has provided this dedicated service to customers including one of the largest credit card Companies in the world. We have reduced their undeliverable mail by 50% and the recycled of tons of paper waste and saved them hundreds of thousands £s.

Brief PowerPoint presentation available from:

email: tim.craig@veri-data.co.uk Telephone: 01244 350700

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Adrian Sargeant, 26 May 2009, 11:14

I'm afraid I agree with the 'TS Member.' Another fine mess we've gotten ourselves into !! How can we possibly legislate against emotion? Moreover, why should we focus on just this one emotion?

Why should guilt be a bad thing? Those of us that were tucking into a hearty meal when news of the Asian Tsunami first broke, probably felt a significant measure of guilt as we mopped up the last of our potatoes and downed the balance of our wine. That such guilt contributed in no small measure to the wave of public support that resulted can not be in doubt. It seems that if guilt is created by circumstances - that is somehow OK - if it is created by fundraisers it is not.

What next I wonder, will we be outlawing appeals based on pity, sympathy, empathy, fear or anger? Do we perhaps need a new resource - a thought police attached to the FRSB perhaps?

We've successfully managed to fudge what should be a straightforward issue. Instead of tying ourselves up in knots in this way we should simply do MUCH better at promoting how members of the public who wish to, can get their names off our mailing and phone lists. It really isn't difficult.

It's also time we stopped being apologists for the promotion of need and took a proactive and positive stance on why we use the techniques and messages that we do. We're not selling double glazing, we're not selling insurance, we're trying to persuade people to tackle poverty, find a cure for cancer and right some of the world's wrongs.

To elaborate on the first example, if the price of restoring someone's sight in the third world is the guilt experienced by the 3 other people who declined their support - thats surely a price worth paying. It thus isn't the appeal that needs to be tackled its the understanding of why we use the messages that we do and hthe realities of what would happen if we didn't.

Its also more than a bit rich to be lectured by a Minister about public trust and confidence right now. If the government really does care about public trust and confidence in fundraising it needs to get focussed on what matters. The mistake has always been to focus on regulation when it should be focused on education. All the extant research indicates that what the public really want from us in terms of performance is pretty close to what we presently deliver. Many so called complaints are based on nothing but a misunderstanding of how fundraising works and/or a lack of knowledge about how to stop communication that is no longer required. The upshot - we need a champion of fundraising activity - a mechanism for dealing with public and sadly, ministerial and journalistic misconceptions. An wider initiative along the lines of www.charityfacts.org would have a markedly more significant impact on the public trust than anything we're doing currently.

[Report this post]

Tim , 26 May 2009, 11:38

Not all beneficiaries of charity wish to be made objects of pity or have our "plight" be used to make people feel guilty.

Some of us want to shake off dependency and campaign for full equal rights.

But charity, with all it's emotional baggage, often interferes with that noble aspiration.

[Report this post]

David Burrows, 26 May 2009, 12:00

We are in the run up to an election and an unpopular government is looking for initiatives that would win the approval of voters. Having a pop at direct mail - the issue that won the 'Brassed off Britain' public poll a couple of years ago - might well be on MPs agenda. So we should respond by demonstrating that self-regulation is working. Regarding 'guilt' - the IoF Code of Practice only mentions guilt in the context of 'financial guilt' i.e. 'We have sent you this lovely gift - or these coins - now give us a donation in return'. The Code says nothing to stop charities 'tugging at the heartstrings', through emotive case studies or images if they wish. The Code implicitly acknowledges that as well as 'comforting the afflicted' charities have the right to 'afflict the comfortable' from time to time.

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