The Fundraising Regulator has said it can see “no real basis” for a complaint made against it to Trading Standards by an arts charity last week.
The Fundraising Regulator was responding to a complaint made by Children and the Arts, a London-based arts charity, who reported the fundraising watchdog to Trading Standards after receiving what it called an “unsolicited invoice” implying that it must pay the regulator’s annual levy.
A spokesman for the Fundraising Regulator strongly denied the accusation however, and said that the letter it sent to Children and the Arts was the same template as it sent to all of the nearly 2,000 charities which fall into the fundraising levy and clearly states that contributions are to be made voluntarily.
“We can see no real basis for the complaint,” said the spokesman. “Because the letter from the chair of the board and chief executive explaining the levy payment is voluntary was sent before the invoice”.
The spokesman said there was a chance Children and the Arts had received the invoice before the letter as “the letter and invoice were sent separately” but said the charity had “no evidence to show that is the case”.
“Given the letter and invoice were sent separately it is possible that a charity might not have received the letter but there is no evidence to show that is the case. The letter is also on our website. If the charity concerned received the letter before the invoice the communications we sent were quite proper and there is no basis for complaint.”
The spokesman also said that the Fundraising Regulator had no intention of changing the wording of its invoices to make clearer that all contributions to the levy are voluntary.
‘Classic case of trying to get money under false pretences’
The chief executive of Children and the Arts however has accused the regulator of trying to raise money “under false pretences” and said it was guilty of the kind of “aggressive” soliciting of donations that it was put in place to stop in charities.
Children and the Arts said that the invoice it received on 16 December from the Fundraising Regulator for £150 as part of its first levy payment didn’t make clear that the fee was voluntary. Jeremy Newton, chief executive of the charity, said he had reported the Fundraising Regulator to Trading Standards for an apparent breach of the 2008 Consumer Protection legislation.
Under the legislation, those convicted can face fines or imprisonment for up to two years, or both.
Newton told Arts Professional that the regulator’s actions were “a classic case of trying to get money under false pretences” and said that the ambiguous wording of the letter and invoice “clearly imply this is not soliciting donations but charging for services”.
“Bombarding charities with invoices in the hope that someone will pass them through for payment without spotting the ‘voluntary’ small-print all smacks of highly unprofessional, non-transparent, over-aggressive fundraising – just the kind of thing the new Regulator was set up to stop,” said Newton.
A spokesman for London Trading Standards – the local Trading Standards authority where the complaint was made – refused to comment on the issue.
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