Give A Little launches Gift Aid update

It is more important than ever for donors to opt-in to Gift Aid so charities can benefit from the 25% uplift in donation revenues. At Give A Little, we know just how much of an impact Gift Aid can make to the charities using our platform. For example, charities subscribing to Give A Little benefited from additional income of £450,000 pounds in the last 12 months that they would not have received if they hadn’t enabled Gift Aid on their fundraising campaigns. 

One of the substantial benefits of cashless giving over cash bucket collections is that charities can utilise software developed especially for the donor facing experience and enable valuable features such as Gift Aid and marketing communications opt-in. In the past, when donors threw coins in a bucket, charities never knew who their donors were, whereas cashless giving allows charities to upload donor contact information, for those that opt-in, to their Customer Relationship Management System (CRM) and take them on a supporter journey. Cashless giving also delivers higher average donation values. At Give A Little, we see average donation values of £10.49 for contactless/ Chip + PIN donations and £40 for online fundraising campaigns.

Currently when charities turn Gift Aid on for a campaign, donors can choose to complete a Gift Aid declaration with their donation. Now with this release they can make a choice to be sent information by email so they can complete the declaration at a later time at their leisure. This is particularly useful when donors are busy or when they are queuing to make a donation as filling out the declaration form can be time-consuming and delay other donors. Charities who need to handle queues often do not enable Gift Aid on their campaigns because of this. Enabling

will allow charities to still benefit from the 25% uplift without causing queues. Some donors who may not previously have given Gift Aid as they were too busy or weren’t sure what is involved, may decide to opt-in later thanks to the updated experience.

If donors choose to

, they will be sent an email giving them information on Gift Aid and a link to make a declaration, so they can make an informed decision at their leisure, to opt-in or not.

When a donor makes a Gift Aid declaration, they now have more flexibility around the type of declaration they make. Specifically they can apply Gift Aid to their donations:

• made in the previous four years and/or 

• for all future donations, or 

• just to this particular donation. 

If they choose to Gift Aid future donations, they will still have the chance to exclude Gift Aid from donation to donation, or cancel it altogether. 

And although not a new feature, a reminder that Give A Little account administrators can export reports with the claim data that HMRC requires making their claim easy and efficient.

It’s incredibly easy to create App and Web fundraising campaigns on Give A Little and choose whether to enable donors to opt-in to Gift Aid. We show you how you can create an online fundraising campaign in just two minutes and share it with a QR code in our recent

.

What is Gift Aid?

Adding Gift Aid to donations means charities and Community Amateur Sports Clubs (CASCs) can claim an extra 25p for every £1 given. It will not cost the donor any extra. The Gift Aid scheme is unique to the UK and donors need to be UK taxpayers. Charities can claim Gift Aid on most donations, but some payments do not qualify (

).

The donor must:

• have paid the same amount or more in Income Tax or Capital Gains Tax in that tax year

• make a Gift Aid declaration that gives the charity or CASC permission to claim it

A declaration has to be made to each individual charity that the donor wants to donate to through Gift Aid.

If HMRC discovers that a charity has claimed gift aid relief on a gift by a non-taxpayer, the legal liability to repay the tax falls on the donor. 

Gift Aid small donations scheme (GASDS)

Charities and CASCs may be able to claim 25% on the following without needing to have a Gift Aid declaration: 

• cash donations of £30 or less

• contactless card donations of £30 or less collected on or after 6 April 2019 (Chip + PIN donations do not qualify)

To qualify, the charity or CASC must have claimed Gift Aid:

• in the same tax year as the charity wants to claim GASDS

• without getting a penalty in the last 2 tax years

• in at least 2 of the last 4 tax years (without a 2-year gap between claims) if the charity is claiming on donations made before 6 April 2017

The amount of small donations on which the repayment can be claimed is capped at £8,000, or ten times the amount of donations on which it claims Gift Aid in the tax year. (See

for more information) 

Give A Little account administrators are able to export records of eligible contactless card donations, which are required to make the claim.

If your charity would like to try out Give A Little and reap the benefits of the updated Gift Aid experience,

!