Posted on 28th January 2010
The Public Fundraising Regulatory Association (PFRA) is set to increase its research into the effects of face-to-face fundraising.
The PFRA wants its members to pool their data on donor attrition and retention to contribute to the Association’s annual surveys. In return, the charities will receive discounts on their registration fees. The PFRA also wants to include international charities in its survey. The research will be published in July.
Last year, the PFRA’s survey found that around half of all donors recruited through face-to-face fundraising cancelled their direct debits within 12 months. Also fundraisers who work in public places to recruit donors have attracted wide-spread criticism and been labelled 'chuggers' (charity muggers) by those who dislike this approach.
However, complaints about this method of recruitment are surprisingly low. In research conducted by the Fundraising Standards Board, only 13.6% of complaints received by charities concerned face-to-face (compared with 31% involving direct mail).
Research consultancy nfpSynergy has also found that when directly prompted to indicate which activities undertaken by charities “annoy” them, only 19% mentioned face-to-face contact, compared with 45% indicating telemarketing.
Members of the PFRA recruited 681,000 new donors in 2008/09, representing a pledge value of £70m.
