How to check a donation request

Why the request is not the thing to check

Year-end brings a heavy run of appeals. Giving Tuesday falls on 1 December 2026, and the weeks around it bring letters, calls, texts, social posts and fundraising pages from groups you know and groups you have never heard of. Many of those come from genuine groups. Some do not, and from the receiving end the two can look the same: a warm voice, a clear need, a button to press.

That is the first thing to accept. A request cannot vouch for itself. A caller who sounds kind, a story that moves you, a page with photographs and a progress bar: all of it can be written by anyone. So the useful question is never "does this sound real?" It is "can I reach the organisation without using anything this request gave me?"

The FTC's advice on giving is built on the same idea. It points you to search a charity's name along with words like complaint, review, rating or scam; to check the IRS Tax Exempt Organization Search to see whether a gift is tax deductible; to confirm who will receive the money before you click a link to donate online; and to treat a request to pay by cash, gift card or wire transfer as a reason to walk away. It says to pay by credit card or check to be safer, that cryptocurrency donations invite scams, and that you should not let anyone rush you. [FTC]

The worksheet on this site turns that advice into a form you fill in while the request is still in front of you. This post explains the thinking behind it, with four invented examples. Every organisation, person, phone number and web address below is made up, and the web addresses end in .example so they cannot be opened.

The order that works

There are five things worth recording, and they work best in this order.

1. How the request reached you. A call, a text, a social post, an email, a person at the door or a crowdfunding page. This matters because it tells you which link or number you must not use to check. If the request came by phone, the number you call back must be one you found yourself.
2. The payment method it asks for. Card on a page you opened yourself, cash, gift cards, wire transfer, cryptocurrency, or a courier who collects from you. Some of these can be disputed afterwards and some cannot. The FTC lists gift cards, wire transfers and cryptocurrency among common scam signs. [FTC]
3. The pressure used. A deadline, an emotional story, a thank-you gift or a claimed match. Pressure is not proof of anything, but it is the reason people skip the checks, so it is worth naming.
4. What you verified independently. The organisation's name from a source you chose, a registration lookup on an official register, a comparison of contact details, and the organisation's own donation page reached without the link you were sent.
5. Your notes. Who said what, and when, so that a report can be specific.

Notice what is missing: a score, a verdict, a green tick. That is deliberate. A worksheet can tell you which items need a stop, which checks are still open and what to ask. It cannot tell you that a request is genuine, and a tool that claimed to would be the most dangerous thing in the process. The only thing that settles the question is you reaching the organisation yourself.

Four worked examples

1. The call from the Larkfield Hearth Fund

Deniz picks up a call on a weekday evening. The caller says they are with the Larkfield Hearth Fund, which helps families heat their homes, and that last winter Deniz "pledged" a gift that was never collected. The caller says the fund is closing its year-end books tonight and the simplest way to settle it is gift cards, with the codes read over the phone.

On the worksheet Deniz ticks: arrived by a phone call; payment by gift cards; pressure from a deadline and an emotional story. Nothing is verified yet.

Deniz does not ask the questions at all. A request that insists on gift cards has already answered them. Thanks for a gift you never made is also a trick the FTC describes. [FTC] Deniz hangs up, searches for "Larkfield Hearth Fund" on her own, looks for the fund on the register, and finds nothing. That result goes into the notes. Because the first two checks were done after the call, not during it, they mean something.

2. The text from Brightwater Animal Rescue Trust

Mara gets a text: "Brightwater Animal Rescue Trust: every gift is matched double until midnight. Give here: brightwater-match.example/give". She does know a group called Brightwater Animal Rescue, though the name in the text has "Trust" on the end.

She ticks: arrived by text message; payment by card (the link opens a card form, which is not a page she opened herself, so she leaves that box unticked); pressure from a deadline and a claimed match.

The lookalike name matters. The FTC notes that names closely resembling real charities may belong to scammers. [FTC] Mara types the address of the rescue group she knows into her browser, finds its donation page, and looks there for any mention of a double match. There is none. She looks up the exact name "Brightwater Animal Rescue Trust" on her state's charity register. There is no entry. She now has a mismatch to record on the worksheet, which moves from an open check to a stop item.

Notice that this did not require deciding whether the Trust is a bad actor. Mara did not rate anyone. She found that the request could not be tied to anything she could reach herself, and that was enough to keep her card details out of the form.

3. The knock from the Tern Hollow Food Pantry Network

Someone in a fleece with a lanyard rings the bell on a Saturday. They say they collect for the Tern Hollow Food Pantry Network, hold out a clipboard, and say that anyone who gives today receives a tote bag. They suggest cash, and add that a colleague can come back for an envelope if there is none in the house.

The worksheet ticks: someone at the door; payment by cash and by a courier collecting; pressure from a thank-you gift and a story about empty shelves.

Nothing here says the collector is dishonest; real groups can collect in person too. The point is that the front step is the worst place to check. The visitor controls the pace, the paperwork and the name. So the answer is simple and polite: ask for a leaflet, say you will give through the organisation's own page if you decide to, and close the door. Afterwards, at the kitchen table, you do the four checks with a name you read off the leaflet and then confirm by search. If the organisation turns out to be real, you give on its page with a card. If you cannot find it, you have lost nothing.

4. The crowdfunding page for the Marsh Lane Community Kitchen

A friend shares a fundraising page titled "Keep Marsh Lane Community Kitchen open this winter". It has photographs, a total, and a line saying all money goes to the kitchen's charity. The organiser is a person, not the kitchen.

The ticks: arrived as a crowdfunding page; payment by card through the page; pressure from an emotional story. The page was not opened by typing its address, so the card box stays unticked.

The FTC's advice is to confirm who will receive the money before you click a link to donate online. [FTC] Here that means two things. First, asking the organiser, through your friend, how the money moves from the page to the kitchen. Second, checking from the kitchen's side: finding the kitchen yourself, looking for its own donation page, and seeing whether it mentions this campaign. If the kitchen has its own page, giving there directly is a simple way to make sure the money reaches it.

What a matched check does and does not tell you

Suppose Deniz, in a different year, gets a letter from a real food bank and does everything right. She finds the name on her own, finds the entry on the register, compares the phone number and address with the ones the food bank publishes on its own site, and reaches the donation page by typing the address. Each check goes in as "Done, matches". The worksheet then reports that all four checks are recorded, and that no stop items were triggered by what she ticked.

It never calls the request safe, because it cannot. Each match closes one question: "is there an organisation by this name", "is it listed", "do the details line up", "can I give where it actually lives". What is left is her decision, and the receipt she should keep.

Two situations show why the checks need an order. In the first, Deniz looked up the register using the name from the call. The register had an entry. But the name came from the request, so all the lookup proved is that the request used a real name, which is exactly what an impersonator would do. The worksheet flags this as an answer that pulls in a different direction: a register check recorded without a name from a source you chose.

In the second, she reached the organisation's own donation page, found everything in order, and then recalled that the caller had asked for gift cards. The worksheet puts the gift card stop item next to the page match and flags the gap. The page takes cards. The caller did not ask for a card. That gap is information, and the right move is to ask the organisation itself, using contact details found yourself, whether it takes gifts in the way the caller described.

If you have already paid

If you paid by gift card, wire, credit or debit card or cryptocurrency, contact the company or your bank right away, say you paid a scammer and ask for a refund. Keep the receipts and any message you received. Report the request at ReportFraud.ftc.gov and to your state charity regulator. The FTC asks for the organisation's or fundraiser's name, its phone number and what the fundraiser said, which is why the notes box on the worksheet is worth filling in while the call is fresh. [FTC] Keep a record of your donations too, and review your statements for charges above what you agreed to or for recurring donations you did not expect.

The same habits cover the rest of the season. If a parcel text asks for a fee, the parcel text examples show what to look for, and the holiday shopping red flags cover shops and sellers. For messages from someone you only know online, the eight-question checker gives a quick read.

When the next request arrives, whether it is a call at dinner or a friend's shared page, open the worksheet before you reply. It takes about three minutes, and it keeps the decision in your hands.