Fundraising body calls on charities to expose 'poor' direct mail at minister's urging

by Noelle McElhatton, Marketing Direct 26-May-09, 11:30

LONDON - The Institute of Fundraising is urging its members to report direct mail campaigns that contravene the body's code of practice that was revamped last year.

The move follows a meeting between IoF leaders and charities minister Kevin Brennan. The minister told the institute he was concerned that ‘poor' direct mail could erode public confidence in charities.

The institute's tough stance also follows the Fundraising Standards Board's recently published annual review, which revealed that 19,600 out of 26,300 complaints from the public last year were about direct mail.

Alistair McLean, chief executive of the FRSB, told Marketing Direct's sister title Third Sector that many breaches of the direct mail code were by charities 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.

A communication was sent to the body's 5,000 members last week asking them to report, anonymously or not, about "poor" mail campaigns.

The institute is particularly interested in campaigns that enclose incentives with little relevance to the cause or those that attempt to provoke guilty feelings to gain a response.

Sanctions may be imposed on charities deemed to have breached the code, and the Institute has not ruled out publishing their names.