Stephen Loveridge is the incorrect spelling for my name. In my case, Steven is correctly spelled with a “v”.

This post is placed here to help you. You may also notice it is an experiment in SEO – which has worked if you found your way correctly to my website through a misspelt search.

Click here to go to my home page.

I recently needed a solution for a small charity to take credit card donations online simply and without technical know-how. This is the result of my research. The solution I found is www.charitygiving.co.uk.

If you find this information useful, please make a donation to Seaborough Church, Dorset, using this link: www.charitygiving.co.uk/seaboroughpcc.

Charity fundraising online has been revolutionised by large firms such as Just Giving, MissionFish and Virgin Money Giving. These firms have enabled hundreds of millions of pounds online to be given at a very low administrative cost to a charity.

However, for a charity which has a small income – for example less than £10,000 – they tend not to be the solution as the subscription or transaction fees are too big to justify the use of the service.

Small charities are generally poorly equipped to deal with credit card payments at all. Even setting up a PayPal account can be another tier of difficulty, before even thinking about Gift Aid.

For exempt charities, such as the Parochial Church Council I run, there is no charity registration number and you run into trouble with some of the online forms.

The solution I found is www.charitygiving.co.uk, run by a charity called The Dove Trust.

• It is simple to sign up.
• They process Gift Aid for you.
• They give you an easy link to add to emails, web sites or Facebook Pages.
• They pay you promptly.
• They send you a paper statement in the post.

Charity Giving makes no charge for taking your payment if Gift Aid is not collected and a tiny charge of 3.1% to take a payment for you if they also process the Gift Aid. This is less than the charge many banks make for small businesses to process a credit card.

Here is a comparison of charges from their site (click on the image for more information):

The solution is simple to set up. There is no need for a web site, but if you do use a web site, they provide very simple code for a button or link. They provide a simple link for you to use in emails or elsewhere (for example on a Facebook Page).

I have tested this and not only is the site simple to use, but the staff are helpful and they make payments on time. You can set up a link or a donation button either as a charity or as an individual fundraiser.

Links to explore this further:

Charity Giving Home Page:
http://www.charitygiving.co.uk/

Charity Registration Page:
https://www.charitygiving.co.uk/charityaccount/register.asp

Registration Page for Individual Fundraising:
https://www.charitygiving.co.uk/fundraising/newpage.asp

Seaborough PCC fundraising link (Please donate!):
http://www.charitygiving.co.uk/seaboroughpcc

Do make a comment below if you have any other ideas about this.

I hope someone can help with explaining exactly what quantitative easing is all about; and honestly say what the Bank of England really wants to achieve.

As I understand it, the formal line is the Bank of England (aka a Government Quango) is going to set about buying up gilts and other government assets from banks, in the hope that this can encourage further lending, so encouraging further consumer spending and helping avert a recession.

The claim is that this is not inflationary as eventually all the half a trillion pounds of Government assets (they’ll get there soon enough) they buy in assets will be sold back onto the market in future.

All this ready cash the big banks will then have will then be lent to businesses, homeowners, credit card punters and so forth and we’ll buy our way out of recession.

Clear so far? Not to me.

1. First of all the banks are not lending to homeowners, small businesses or anyone else; and they are quite likely to just hoard this liquidity on the balance sheets anyway. If they do lend, it will be to safe blue chip companies.
2. Second, Big Dave Cameron has just told us all to pay off our credit card debt and stop spending.
3. Thirdly, Europe is about to be bust and the banks are going to be told to recapitalise even further.
4. Fourthly, Big Merv King is talking down the economy so much, everyone will need to turn to prozac. Moreover, he is also saying small business does not matter as it is such a small part of the economy.

So is this just another recapitalisation of the banks?

Possibly. I am not a conspiracy theorist, mostly as Government and the Corporations can’t run a piss up in a brewery, let alone a complex financial scam.

My take on this is the following:

• I think quantitative easing may save some banks again.
• I think that consumer spending and the economy will not be helped by it at all.
• I think it will be inflationary.

As a consequence savers (mostly the old) will suffer badly, but those of us with mortgages and ongoing liquidity may benefit in the long run, as our lending shrinks in real terms. Most of all, the Government’s lending will shrink in real terms as well and this will enable the borrowing cycle to continue.

Sadly I do not that that small, medium or bug business will ultimately benefit like this, especially if we continue to over-regulate employing people and running a business; and if we over-regulate the bankers as well.

In the mean time, with precious few other tools in the economists’ armoury, how is our economy going to thrive? Is this the right thing to try anyway, notwithstanding all of the above?

What does anyone else think?