A growing number of charities are sending fundraisers door to door to capitalise on the rise in people working from home.
According to the Chartered Institute of Fundraising, sign-ups for direct debit donations are expected to double pre-pandemic numbers this year.
The VSO Voluntary Service Overseas and Oxfam were among the high-profile charities to have relaunched door-to- door fundraising during the pandemic, despite having said they would not use the method, The Daily Telegraph reported.
Door-to- door fundraising is seen by some people as an invasion of privacy, particularly when elderly and vulnerable people are approached. Several household names, including Age UK, have said they do not do it. The RNLI has avoided this type of fundraising due to concerns over safety and public trust. Daniel Fluskey, director of policy and communications at the Chartered Institute of Fundraising CIOF, said: Since the lock-in, people's habits and ways of working have changed and we have seen door-to- door fundraising raise huge amounts of money at a time when it is really needed. He said door-to- door fundraising is a brilliant and cost-effective way for charities to find new supporters and to hear about the difference their donations can make. Thousands of people donate a month to a charity because of a conversation they had with a fundraiser at their door.
A conversation at someone's door is something fundraisers do responsibly and with care - they follow a code of fundraising practice that goes above and beyond the law and must always be polite and respectful. The number of sign-ups at the door has doubled over the past four months compared with the same period in 2019 according to figures obtained by The Daily Telegraph. In May this year, the last month for which data was available, members of the CIOF recorded 30,669 sign-ups, compared to 17,933 in May 2019.
In 2016 William Shawcross, then chairman of the Charity Commission, said charities should stop pestering people through aggressive street collecting, cold-calling and intrusive junk mail. He said it was wrong for vulnerable people, older people, generous people to be hounded on the telephone, in the letterbox or in the street.
VSO and Oxfam said they had made the decision to restart door-to- door fundraising because it was one of the most cost-effective ways to recruit new supporters. Both said their fundraisers followed the code of practice.