My Son Got Sucked in by Greenpeace

Yesterday afternoon, on only his second day of Uni, my son was approached by a Greenpeace rep. The dude asked my son (Josh) to donate $1. When Josh said he didn't have any money, the dude told him he could donate online and shoved an ipad in his face. Josh was nervous he was going to be late for his lecture and didn't want to be rude, so he signed up for what he thought was $1. Turns out, he signed up for $35 per month. He was definitely misled by the dude. Josh closed his account so they can't take any more money and asked the dude for a refund. Dude said his manager would call. No call so far. I have called Greenpeace directly, emailed and messaged on Facebook, as well as posting on their page. This is what I posted (again and again):

Gonna keep posting this until I get a response. Yesterday afternoon, my son was ambushed by one of your charity muggers and asked to donate $1. When he said he didn't have any cash, he was told he could donate online and he signed up to donate $1. It was not made clear to him that he was actually donating $35 on an ongoing basis. The money has already been deducted from his account. Not informing him of the amount and the frequency of the donations is in clear violation of the Fundraising Appeals Act 1998 PART 2—PROVISIONS APPLYING TO ALL FUNDRAISING APPEALS 7. False statements while seeking donations (1) In conducting or participating in a fundraising appeal, a person must not make or give any representation or oral or written statement in relation to the appeal to another person that misleads or deceives, or that is likely to mislead or deceive— (a) the other person; or (b) anyone else to whom the other person may make, repeat or give the representation or oral or written statement. Penalty: In the case of a corporation, 15 240 penalty units. In any other case, 120 penalty units or imprisonment for 12 months or both. I have emailed and called your organisation about this matter and am looking forward to receiving a refund in a timely manner.

Still waiting on any sort of response from them. I know they have read at least one message on FB. What else can we do?

Related Stores

greenpeace.org.au
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Comments

  • +272

    It's been less than a day. Give them time.

    Not sure why he closed his account rather than just stopping the debit. Seems like an over reaction. At worst he's learnt a $35 lesson on charity muggers.

    I know you want to protect your son, but he's at uni now - he needs to learn to deal with these things himself.

    • +138

      Seems like an over reaction

      Apple doesn't fall far from the tree

    • +25

      Gotta cut him some slack for some people uni is still just an extension of high school.. i.e useless and provides nothing but fun social entertainment in a new environment..he is probably still innocent and naive gullible.. i.e the perfect target for charity donations.

      But yeah most people know better to just walk away, poor lad/sucker (no offense.. in my younger days I have been caught in the scientology and others speel many times in my uni and high school days and couldn't get out because I wasn't confident enough to say no thanks or just walk by or say (profanity) you).

      sorry but pardon my language.

    • +19

      That sucks that this happened to your son, but he's probably learnt a good lesson about reading what he's signing up for.

    • 👍🏾

    • +5

      Alas I do support the work that greepeace do but I fell into their trap years ago. I requested they stop taking money out of my account which they didn't do, I asked my bank to stop all direct debits which they also didn't do. Then my bank charged me overdrawn fees which I contested. I tried to close the bank account but they said I needed to pay outstanding amount. I told them I would but could they freeze the account which they promised to do, but again didn't. I was a poor uni student at the time and eventually my mother got involved a paid out the $400 or so fees to close the account. I will never financially support greenpeace or the bank of Queensland ever again.

      I think closing the account was the best thing to do personally. Telstra routinely pull the same stunt.

    • It's actual not an over reaction… banks are often no help and refuse to interfere with these, they suggest you contact the company and get them to stop instead. Experienced this couple of times.

  • +13

    Find out the agency they work for…it's often not even the charity of their T-Shirt.

    • -7

      Those people are normally sent to agencies from centerlink.

    • +11

      This. There's heaps of "fundraising" companies that hire backpackers or unemployed and get them to ambush you at train stations and intersections. Backpackers keeps 25%. Company keeps 60% odd percent for "costs" and SFA goes to the actual charity.

      It won't have anything to do with Greenpeace. They'll probably have to wait 6 months to even receive the "donation"

  • +30

    Remember, once you have donated one time, they will call you all the time asking for more. I think I read somewhere that out of every $1 donation, only like 10 cents actually went to the cause while the balance is to pay for wages and advertisement, etc.

    • +6

      …and they will onsell your info to other charities and they will spam your mailbox forevermore!

      • +6

        It's not that bad. I was giving to Greenpeace for a while, then stopped. They've called me 2 or 3 times over a span of maybe 2 years since I cancelled. No unsolicited contact from other charities. I don't regret what I gave, maybe if I gave more the Barrier Reef wouldn't be (profanity).

    • +46

      I think I read somewhere that out of every $1 donation, only like 10 cents actually went to the cause

      Do your research, there are efficient charities and there are inefficient charities.

      • +4

        Do your research, there are efficient charities and there are inefficient charities.

        It's not clear whether the fundraising expense includes the commissions/salaries paid to 3rd party fundraisers.

        I suspect it doesn't.

        The red cross 'fundraising' cost is listed at 4%, while WWF and WorldVision are 11% and 14%, respectively. I see just as many street muggers from RedCross as I do from WWF and WorldVision in Sydney CBD … something doesn't add up.

        • +1

          You're probably right, but consider also that World Vision is advertising on TV all the damn time.

          Red Cross does advertise about blood donation, but that probably counts as an operational expense, rather than a fundraising expense.

        • +3

          Fundraising and marketing are essential parts of any charities. You need to grow and get the word out.

        • @abb: TV advertising is often free for charities, basically if a slot isn't filled it goes to a charity. Watch sbs late at night and you will see tonnes

        • @abb: I agree. I am sure the government would pay for the advertising of the Blood bank as they fund it.

        • @abb:
          The red cross blood service is different to the red cross. the blood service is funded by the Australian governments

      • That's 76% of the donations received by Red Cross. The agency takes a large chunk, and the rep that approaches you on the street takes a large commission, THEN Red Cross sees the money. Only 10cents to go the cause sounds about right if you just donate to the dudes on the street.

        I have no source, I've only read that somewhere.

        • +1

          http://www.redcross.org.au/annualreport_2016/financials/wher…

          This seem to be their latest report, large chunk spent on migration support, why does red cross even get involved in migration support baffles me, I always thought red cross is more on emergency type of program like saving lives.

        • @stargalaxy: "We provide help and support to refugees, asylum seekers, immigration detainees and other people who are vulnerable as a result of migration."

        • +1

          @stargalaxy:

          The activities of the Red Cross (and / or the Red Crescent in places where they operate under that banner) are directed by the 7 foundation principles of the RC. They work in many areas - refugees, migrants, the elderly, youth, the environment, disaster relief (people tracing, amongst other things) and they also promote knowledge and understanding of the Geneva conventions and IHL - International Humanitarian Law.

          Essentially, they can and do offer assistance as long as that offer / program doesn't conflict with the guiding principles… but they do a crap job of explaining to "Joe Public" just how much they do. I haven't been involved with them for years, so I don't know what specific programs that offer these days, but they were and I assume still are a very impressive "quiet achiever" kind of organisation.

        • @stargalaxy: I don't think Deridas was disputing the fact that with the money they do receive, they use it properly.

          The thing is, when you donate via someone on the street, the charity never sees the vast majority of the money donated, therefore, it can't actually spend it poorly, or properly, if it never has it in the first place.

          You are much better off just donating directly and skipping the international backpacker student trying to lure you into a $35/month "donation" to their employer.

      • +2
      • Where does the Clinton Foundation rank on that list? Was Australia making a good choice sending tens of millions of Australia's tax payers' money to them before suddenly cutting all donations after the election and outbreak of a certain theory?

        That said, I almost got sucked in to the same tactic when I was in uni. "Donate $1 a day to save lives!". It sure plays on your moral consciousness when you know any better. I even pulled out my debit card but ultimately stopped because I didn't trust entering my details into a stranger's iPad.

      • You have to be careful about this. Your statement might be accurate if you are just looking at face to face fund-raising on its own. No charity in Australia actually operates on a 90% cost of fund-raising so it should be made clear this is not the case. Often poorer ratios would be 47% while Bette roles are up around 90%

      • Sure, but putting a percentage next to a heading is easy. The hard part is getting the details under those headings to be legitimate.

        What do terms like "program costs", or "advocacy work" really mean?

        Following from your advice, I thought I'd check out the latest 90 page annual report from World Vision: https://www.worldvision.com.au/docs/default-source/annual-re…

        $347.5M of their expenses, or 78.4%, of their expenses went on "International Programs"

        International Programs are: "…all cash, food … and goods (including medicines) designated for our international programs. It also includes funds transferred to the Partnership’s Treasury Office and designated for field programs which have not yet been committed to a specific project but will be allocated to projects in future years…"

        Is that enough information and transparency for you to be confident that the money was efficiently spent?

        • +3

          Yes, that would be enough.

          But if it helps, I worked as a consultant for one of World Vision's projects in West Africa. I understand how WV conduct field operations work, and the challenges are immense. I can state categorically that the money goes where they say they it does. I think the better question is - is their work sustainable? Are they focus on the most pressing issues? Those questions are more important.

        • @Crashdown:

          Look up Effective Altruism, Ted talk and books, very interesting

        • +1

          So with the remaining money not spent, is it pushed into a hedge fund?

      • Cos they the NGOs pays other companys to do their fundraising.

        the dude that approaches you on the street or calls you up gets paid $25 a hour.

        that's where your money went.

      • I think that might be misconstrued.

        I think it would be accurate if you donated directly.

        Most of the time we don't, even though we're led to believe we are.

        The thing is they all use dirty tactics, contractors, because it works… short term…

        Long term, people like me rarely donate anymore… not interested in guiltmail

      • My understanding with these chuggers is that 100% of the payments for the first x months (normally 12 I believe) go to the collection agency. After that the charity get the full amount.

      • -1

        "We investigated ourselves and found nothing wrong"

        Is what I see when you link their own marketing material.

        • +1

          These reports tend to be generated by external auditors.

    • +3

      You might be thinking of the Shane Warne Foundation. Reportedly 16%.
      http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3337449/Allegations-…

      • +1

        The Shane Warne Foundation was giving charities a bad name.
        Thank God it's dead.
        God comes with a capital 'G'.

        A lot of the others have very low overheads, as covered by Crashdown and abb.

    • +6

      There are charities way more effective
      See,
      http://www.givewell.org/
      https://effectivealtruism.org.au/

    • +14

      Using money raised elsewhere in the charity isn't necessarily a bad thing. What if I told you that alot of charities spend quite a bit of the donors money on advertising? Sure you think its sounds bad however how about if I told you they were spending 5million dollars and turning it into 15million dollars to send to those in need? There is no reason why charities can't operate like normal business and maximise the money they can get to help those in need. This includes paying for good staff. Please take 20min to check this podcast https://www.ted.com/talks/dan_pallotta_the_way_we_think_abou…

      • +1

        +1. I always bring this up every time people start claiming that "charities should only spend donations directly on the cause, any investment in attracting more donations is a waste of my donation."

  • +10

    It's interesting to note that these reps get a commission for each signup, so they really have an incentive to push for donations.

    • -1

      I have a friend who makes around $150k a year on commissions, I was disgusted when she told me. Yes she probably brings in millions for the charity but I surely we can cut out that middle person and the Charity keeps it

      • Holy what are you serious? She must be a b2b caller and not an on the street donate giver/fleecer

        • +7

          She is a street charity mugger, the ones with the clip boards and optimism. She is model material and pretty much targets the blokes in suits. She only gets the Commission if they keep the plan for a minimum of 3 months and every month after that gets like $5 a month. So her pay is exponential if they all keep signed on.

        • +1

          @cypher67: damn that's a lot of commission.. 150k wow thats like 3000+ annual subscriptions ($5 x 9 = $45 : 150,000 / 45 = 3333.333 etc) or triple that in 6 monthly subscriptions etc

          She must make a lot of hustle

          5-10 a day or less over a few years depending etc

        • +3

          @cypher67:

          She is model material and pretty much targets the blokes in suits.

          I wonder if she offers any other incentives!

        • +15

          She is a street charity mugger

          What's with the neg votes … street workers are street workers.

        • @sp00ker:
          The difference is that there is honesty in some street workers, and not in others.

        • @cypher67: Does she target Martin Place? Have a pic?

        • +3

          @peterpeterpumpkin:

          That's a little creepy isn't it? I mean there's plenty of other good looking charity muggers around the city … yet you want to stalk one that's randomly mentioned on a internet forum?

        • +6

          @cypher67:

          her pay is exponential if they all keep signed

          Her pay is proportional*

        • +1

          @cypher67:

          reminds me of what my mate told me about hot chicks shoe polishers in London making a couple 100 an hour

        • @Kangal: lol I met a cute one during my mlm days.. my age my type my ethnicity everything.. sometimes I think I should have stayed around or got her number for more "meetings" and see where I could have gotten lucky haha lol.

          Asians are the best ok that's enough from me sad and lonely desperate creeper side showing a little bit too much outside for me.

      • +19

        Yeh and I earn 200k cleaning the toilets at public parks! Pretty sure your friend is talking out of her ass.

      • +3

        Do you see the flaw here? No, you can't just cut out the middle person. It is an investment to pay the middle person to bring in the donations, because without them motivating people to donate no those donations would not come in at all.

        Funny to me reading responses in this thread unhappy that it costs charities money to run the business side of their operation that delivers the charitable side. Are you going to go work full time for free? No? Surprise they pay their staff in order to function.

        In the case of your friend - paying collectors in commissions is potentially better than paying people a set wage, as it ensures donations brought in correlates to a set cost going out. Versus paying everyone $70k per year though most may not bring in enough to cover themselves.

    • +1

      Many of the reps don't get an hourly wage at all. If they don't sign people up, they don't get paid.

      • That's how the system works gotta have some carrots to get in the shticks

  • +15

    $35 is not very expensive for a lesson on Greenpeace and similar organization.

    • While I don't think much of Greenpeace what you have here is probably nothing to do with greenpeace. These scumbag organisations that run the charity muggers aren't actually part of the related charities. If you ever care about any charity never EVER give charity muggers a single cent or any of your time, treat them like fleas on a dog and stay away from them. Only a tiny fraction of what you donate would ever end up at the charity.

  • +80

    the first mistake he made was making eye contact

    • +5

      What if (s)he was hot? Plenty to be learnt by talking to good looking charity muggers…

      • +1

        Sunnies and a walking stick, then?

    • +1

      Wouldn't blame him if he was trying get their number people have paid more for less.

  • -2

    why are uni students so stupid?

    • +14

      Replace uni with high school and your answer becomes clearer.

      Cut them some slack though they still have got a long way to go as do I and probably many others.

      • +3

        why are high school students so stupid?

        • Yup exactly right. Gotcha.

        • @AlienC: why so stupid?

        • +6

          @altomic: stupid is a bit of a harsh term. Innocent would be better. As you grow up you learn to say (profanity) you to more things you don't like instead of awkward heeehehhhehheheehhh or in this case a $35 subscription to green power I mean peace

        • +13

          We don't all come out of the womb bitter, twisted, smoking a cigar and cursing. Lessons learnt to get from naive to worldly can indeed be expensive. Some kids have a knack for learning when someone's fleecing them but many don't. There's a lot of stress and distraction for the kid on the first day of uni.

        • +4

          @AlienC: Yes, but if mummy is bailing you out every time you don't probably learn.

        • @syousef: well said

        • +1

          @Johnx: very true but you have to cut them some slack everybody is different and we all have different strengths and different weaknesses so a combination of the greater good beats the lesser evil imho.. in this case mummy might bail him out but he might use that get out of free card to good use like investing future time in his street smarts than just being bitter and depressed that he lost out to a money hungry charity.

          Good in good out net positive benefit effect.

      • Exactly. Current new university students are only about 2-3 weeks out of high school…

    • It's probably got something to do with the fact that they're straight out of high school? I dunno, just a guess…. ;)

    • +1

      just because he hasn't experienced it before doesn't make him stupid. That's just naive.

  • +30

    Maybe this is a great time to teach your son to say a polite but firm no.

    • +6

      would have been a great lesson 10 years ago..

    • Reminded me of this

    • He has to learn that lesson by himself as everybody draws their own line and setting his line for him would be like somebody ordering you around to do whatever it is they want to do. Father or not free will rules all. But yeah I get what you are saying maybe mention to him that it is ok to say no and lots of people do it and he won't hurt the solicitors/marketers feelings.

  • +14

    The scumbag chuggers (Charity Muggers) work for a marketing company which typically takes around 85% of the first years donation. Most are backpackers who couldn't give a stuff about the cause they are collecting money for and will therefore tell you whatever you want to hear to get you to sign on the dotted line so they can get their commission. By the time you get wise to what they have signed you up for, they are off on their next goon fuelled trip to the next town.

    Edit: One of the main 'Chugger' companies is Appco which has been in the news a lot recently - http://www.smh.com.au/business/former-chuggers-join-class-ac…

    • +2

      This is different from capitalism and politicians and life how?
      Everyone is selling you shit you dont need and they dont care about.

      Cancel the membership. They don't bill you straight away anyway and there is a cooling off period.
      Jesus…life really isn't that hard.

      • How about just not signing up in the first place and not wasting charities time and money?

        • Some people are unfortunately not that smart or have enough available brain power or space to handle that.. usually other life priorities are taking precedence or they are in automatic robot mode. I know I have to be consciously aware to fend off these vultures otherwise I am in happy stress care free la la land and open and vulnerable to all sorts of on the streets money/wallet attacks. We win some we lose some.

    • This. Spot on. I am an absolutely calm and friendly person, but I have to admit that these charity scumbag collectors are a massive pest to mankind.

      Did you know that these backpackers get up to 200AUD for every person which signs up through them? I have been harassed multiple times from them and faced with anger, pushing attitude, rudeness and so have my friends and colleagues.

  • +20

    sons a bit soft. should of said no and walked off.

    • +2

      It's a life lesson which hopefully he will learn over time, be assertive with these people & don't worry about hurting their feelings (but no need to be rude). I nearly pushed one out of the way one time when he stepped into my path.

    • +4

      "should have"

    • Charity muggers and other assorted snake oil salesmen are trained to be master manipulators so it's not unheard of to be caught in their spell if you haven't encountered them before.

      That's why there's the saying "fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me".

  • +3

    ITT: University student learns that sometimes the best option is a polite, yet firm, No!

    • I have learned to smile and say a loud and clear "no thanks!" to all door-to-door and street-accosting people.

      I was a Mormon missionary once myself, and appreciated a quick no from people who really weren't going to listen to my message anyway.

  • +10

    I have no doubt that the Greenpeace rep was disingenuous. He/she was probably compliant too. To that point, don't you think you'd get more bang for your son's $35 bucks by letting him learn a lesson in getting sucked in and to not buy so much candy from people trying to suck you in?

    Your personal issue is giving your son a free pass and he will likely learn very little from this.

    Kids need to fail you know….

    I too like ADTR :)

  • +13

    I've had chuggers blatantly lie to my face about the cost of their charity. One chugger in central Sydney said "It's only $30 per month, and you get all that back on tax anyway." The direct meaning of what she said was that I pay $30, and get all that money back from the tax department. An obvious lie. I pulled her up on that and she quickly lost interest in me.

    Always ignore chuggers. They start with the line 'Can I ask you a quick question?' The correct answer always is "sorry, no thanks". By responding any other way you're giving in to their carefully constructed, psychologically manipulative script to extract as much money out of you as possible.

    Chuggers now follow up with the line of 'Aww, you're breaking my heart!' if the chugger is of the opposite sex. Sorry chuggers, the answer is still a polite and firm "no".

    • +10

      Just reply: "Sorry, I don't speak English."

      It buys you a few seconds to Waltz by.

      • +4

        You are supposed to use "No habla ingless".

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