Top charity giving sites Choose the best fundraising site

MyDonate is a an offering from BT in April 2011. It is based on a no commission principle, meaning it gives the most directly to charities from your donation, plus it charges them no subscription fee whatsoever.

Which charities are registered?

Currently 240 are registered and the number's rising. Only two of the top 10 are included, but it's unlikely to stay this way. After launching with just 19 charities in early April 2011, it had added another 200 within a week, and it expects further increases in the near future.

Charities currently include both big organisations such as the NSPCC and Scope to smaller more local charities.

Of the top 10 so far?

How easily can charities set-up a page?

Charities can register totally free online for MyDonate and the aim is for them to be activated within 24 hours. Once this is done a charity can create and publish their profile including forthcoming events, pictures and links to social medial channels and their own website, after which the fundraising can begin.

How easily can individuals set-up a page?

Setting up a page takes less than 5 minutes:

• Click start fundraising

• Decide if you're joining an organised event, creating your own challenge or celebrate someone special

• Enter basic details such as the event, date, fundraising target

• Enter in your registration details included name, address and e-mail

• Choose your web address, add text, images and personal message

• Save the page and share the link with your friends.

Bmycharity was one of the first online giving portals, set up by Royal Marines Ben Brabyn and Matt Cooper in 2000. It is based on a no commission principle, meaning it gives the most directly to charities from your donation. In March 2010 massive charity Help for Heroes acquired the site, and with their help the site remains free to use and offers the biggest amount in direct donations to charities.

Which charities are registered?

350 charities are on the site at present - but with 5 to 10 charities signing up each week this is likely to increase. The charities include some of the big organisations like Barnardo's and Cancer Research, as well as some smaller school and church charities.

Of the top 10?

How easily can charities set-up a page?

To register, charities must provide information by post or email, then wait for this to be processed, which can take up to 2 weeks. Once the information in processed, Bmycharity will set up the basic page, which charities can then adapt to include videos, links and also broadcast live via webcam.

How easily can individuals set-up a page?

Setting up a page takes less than 5 minutes:

• Search for your charity

• Choose become an online fundraiser

• Enter basic registration details like name, address, email

• Either select a fundraising event from the drop down list or choose 'fundraising' and create page to set up your own

• Choose your web address, add text and images

• Save the page and share the link with your friends.

Not suprisingly, Virgin Money Giving is the online fundraising arm of Virgin Money. It's a not-for-profit site borne out of the company's sponsorship of the London Marathon, and is a relatively large site with around 1,600 charities currently on its books.

Which charities are registered?

Amongst its 1,600 charities, Virgin Money Giving has the top ten all signed up as well as other large charities like BBC Children In Need.

Of the top 10?

How easily can charities set-up a page?

Registering a charity takes a minumum of 5 days, and consists of a lot of form filling, including bank details, HMRC forms and Trustee details. Charities must also pay the set-up fee before registration is complete. After that, Virgin Money Giving creates a basic page for them, with the charity's name and logo, links to all of your charity's pages, a 'donate now' box and a 'contact us' box with the charity's address, email, phone number and website. The page can then be customised by the charity by adding extra pages, uploading photos and text.

How easily can individuals set-up a page?

Virgin Money Giving has a lot of extra options to add to your page, which makes it a bit more complicated and fussy to set up:

• Click 'create your page'

• Choose the reason you are fundraising from 'organised event', 'personal challenge', 'special occasion' or 'someone special'.

• Fill in the challenge details (what, where, when etc)

• Seach and select your charity, or click the 'invite them to join' option if not listed

• Enter your registration details

• Create your web address

• Select create my page

• Choose which widgets you want to use, from countdown calendar, photo gallery, blog, video and Twitter

• Add pictures and text (or extra video, blog and Twitter information if chosen)

• Save the page and share via email or Facebook.

The Charity Giving site is maintained by the Dove Trust, a charity in itself which has been in operation for 27 years. It hosts mostly smaller charities and has a very local community feel to it, so if that's more your bag this may be for you. It also doesn't charge charities a thing to set up a page, which is good news for smaller causes.

Which charities are registered?

Over 2000 charities are registered on the site, and the fact it charges charities no fees means it's very small charity friendly, but still has the top ten charities on its books.

Of the top 10?

How easily can charities set-up a page?

Charities need to register online, which takes about 5 minutes, but then have to wait until their registration is processed, which can mean several hours. Once this is done, a page will automatically be created by the site, which charities can then adapt and change as they need with photos and text etc.

How easily can individuals set-up a page?

It takes less than 5 minutes to set up a page:

• Click 'create your own fundraising page'

• Enter registration details

• Search and select your charity

• Enter event details

• Add text and choose address

• Add photos

• Share the link

Sponsor-me is the fundraising section of the Charities Trust, a payroll giving and corporate donation charity.

Which charities are registered?

Over 40,000 charities, of all sizes, are listed at present.

Of the top 10?

How easily can charities set-up a page?

Charities register via the Charities Trust online form. They then have an online donation page allowing fundraisers on Sponsor-me to select them when they set up a page. There is no cost for a charity to register.

How easily can individuals set-up a page?

Setting up takes just a few minutes, once you have registered for a Charities Trust online account and confirmed registration via the link sent to your email address (can take around 10 minutes to arrive):

• Sign in to your account

• Click 'create account' on the left hand side under Fundrasing Account

• Search for the charity you want to support and click 'add charity' and 'continue', you can choose more than one if you like

• Fill in the details of your event

• Click 'Create Event'

The Big Give is a not-for-profit website, with all running costs covered by the Reed Foundation (the charitable arm of Reed Specialist Recruitment). The charges which they make are from the Charities Trust (a not-for-profit HMRC approved donation processor, and a registered charity) to cover credit card processing and admin costs.

Which charities are registered?

Over 6,800 worldwide charities are registered on the site. These can be niche charities in far away countries, which help with things like building schools in slum areas and helping with education in poorer towns.

Of the top 10?

How easily can charities set-up a page?

Charity registration can take only 5 minutes with the Big Give, as they use information from the Charity Comission which reduces the amount of info charities need to give. Charities then create projects for which they need donations - e.g. helping banana farmers in the Caribbean by setting up a market. The site's creator refers to this as a 'shop window' process to promote their work rather than an events fundraising page.

How easily can individuals set-up a page?

Sadly individuals can't set up their own page on this site, but can track down projects and charities which they would like to donate to or to fundraise offline for.

Every Click has a slightly different way of doing things, as it allows fundraisers to select a charity even if it isn't registered on the site by contacting them seperately once funds have been raised. It is a profit making company, and also allows registered users to raise money by searching the web through Yahoo and shopping on eBay.

Which charities are registered?

Through the site you can raise for the UK's 220,000 charities, or elect to raise for all charities connected to the site.

Of the top 10?

How easily can charities set-up a page?

The site uses the UK's charities list as provided by the Charity Commission, meaning fundraisers can find the charity they need. Once funds have been raised, the charity will be contacted, and they will then need to register on the site to collect their funds. To do this, they need to complete an online form and have their charity credentials verified, which can take up to a week.

How easily can individuals set-up a page?

It only takes about 5 minutes:

• Choose your charity or raise for all

• Register your details

• Create your page and add basic info

• It may take up to three minutes for your page to be verified.

Just Giving is probably the best known of the online fundraising sites with over 8,000 charities registered on it. It is a profit-making site and attracts the big names like Cancer Research and the British Heart Foundation, but this does come at a cost to charities, which the bigger organisations can probably afford more than the smaller charities.

Which charities are registered?

There are over 8,000 charities on the site.

Of the top 10?

How easily can charities set-up a page?

Charities must register through an online form, then complete three further forms for Gift Aid, bank and direct debit details which must be returned with a recent bank statement.

Once received, these forms are checked for fraud, but JustGiving try to have a charity's page set-up within 24 hours of receiving their forms.

How easily can individuals set-up a page?

Making a basic page is pretty simple, and takes about 5 minutes:

• Click make your page

• Enter registration details

• Search and choose your charity

• Choose type of event

• Choose your web address

• Edit photos and text

• Save the page (you can add fancy widgets later).

Global Giving only launched its UK version in 2008, so it's still relatively new in the online fundraising field, and counts Google, Expedia, eBay and Merril Lynch amongst its corporate partners. It is a profit-making site.

Which charities are registered?

Global Giving operates on a 'project' basis, supporting 1,500 projects in mostly developing countries, for around 150 individual charities. These projects range from providing ergonomic benches for weavers in Guatemala to building children's homes in Haiti.

Of the top 10? The site has Global versions of Red Cross, Oxfam, the Salvation Army and Save the Children, but strictly speaking it features so-called 'grassroots' projects from smaller global organisations.

How easily can charities set-up a page?

It's a bit tricky for charities to sign up as the site only opens up to new charities a few times a year. If a charity wants to register, it must first register its interest, then once the site has checked its charity credentials, it may be offered a trial period in which to promote one of its projects. The full registration process can take a very long time.

How easily can individuals set-up a page?

It only takes a couple of minutes to sign-up and set up a fundraiser:

• Click on find a project

• Create fundraiser

• Enter registration details

• Enter basic fundraising details

• Find projects

• Click on a project's title to add it to your fundraiser.

Mission Fish is a registered charity which allows charities to raise money online through eBay sales, allows average sellers to donate a proportion or all of their profits to charity, or allows one-off donations to charities registered on its site.

Which charities are registered?

There are 4,605 charities on the site, ranging from small community-based appeals to national charities.

Of the top 10?

How easily can charities set-up a page?

To register, charities need to fill in an online form, then send their charity documentation via email, fax or post. Mission Fish then vet the info and validate their registration, which takes a business day. Charities are then listed on the site and eBayers can choose to donate to them.

How easily can individuals set-up a page?

This can be a complicated process if you are starting from scratch as you will have to register as an eBay seller and register on PayPal before then electing to donate to charity.

If you already have an eBay account:

• Click sell, and choose the advanced sell option

• Enter the item details and description as you would a normal listing

• At the bottom of the page is a 'raise money for your favourite charity section'. Search and select your charity.

• Select the percentage you would like to give from your donation

• You will need to register a visa or mastercard in order to have your fees refunded

• Select Gift Aid if applicable

• List your item.