Funding for the Payroll Giving Quality Mark, which recognises excellence in payroll giving, is likely to be discontinued by the Cabinet Office, the Association of Payroll Giving Organisations has said.
The membership organisation for bodies providing payroll giving services said the scheme has been supported by the Cabinet Office for the past nine years, but according to APGO that funding is likely to be withdrawn.
It said that its members would continue to recognise excellence among companies.
In May 2013, the Cabinet Office agreed to fund the scheme for two more years, with an award of £92,000 provided to the Institute of Fundraising to run it in 2014. But at the time, funding for 2015 was still uncertain.
Panikos Efthimiou, chair of APGO said: “We are concerned that funding for the successful Payroll Giving Quality Mark and the Excellence Awards is in doubt. But we are committed to doing all we can to continue recognising companies for their great work in encouraging their employees to give regularly.
“Payroll giving is an extremely effective way of encouraging people to make a regular commitment to supporting charities, and needs the full commitment of government, payroll giving agencies and charities to make it grow.”
APGO is a membership organisation consisting of professional experts from the payroll giving community. It specialises in supporting businesses and charities to develop payroll giving schemes in the workplace and awards certificates to companies that are committed to signing employees to long-term charitable giving.
“Providing recognition of companies’ work has proved very effective in encouraging businesses to back regular giving by employees,” said Efthimiou. “We are determined to ensure that we keep on recognising and praising those businesses which show such a great commitment to the work of charities in this country.”
According to APGO, payroll giving is the most tax effective way for an employee to donate to a charity. Last year £134m was raised for the charity sector through 1.1million employees. But the figure was a drop of £21m from the previous year.
Speaking last year at the Institute of Fundraising’s payroll giving conference, Nicky Morgan, MP and financial secretary to the Treasury, said there was a lack of awareness about the benefits of payroll giving among MPs.
Morgan said charities were not doing enough to make donors aware of payroll giving and the total of £1.5bn raised through the scheme to date was not as widespread as it should be.
The Cabinet Office was approached by Civil Society News for comment but did not respond at the time of going to press.
