Setting up a fund-raising donation page for a Nepali village

April 29, 2015 9:01 PM

In light of the recent earthquakes, I am looking for the best and easiest way to setup a page that accepts donations for a small, local, Nepali nonprofit.

I have been doing some back-and-forth with friends in Nepal, and I know that the village that I lived and volunteered in was (like so many other places) hit hard. I've already donated to a general Nepal fund, but would like to help out this village if there's any way I could do so.

Over Facebook, I have spoken with one of the people at the non-profit and she let me know that while they don't have a donation web page, they do have an "organization account number" that people can direct funds to.

I have a message out to her asking if this "account number" corresponds to a regular Nepali bank account (that's what I'm assuming).

Assuming that it is a bank account number for an account in a Nepal-based bank, what is the easiest and best way to set up a page where visitors can enter their billing details, choose an amount, click DONATE, and have the funds piped over to this non-profit’s account in Nepal?

I'm assuming that something like GoFundMe might work? (I see that they have several similar fund-raisers) That seems easy enough, although I'd kind of like it to be open-ended as opposed to having a set amount that is the ceiling for donations.

Thank you in advance for any ideas or suggestions!

posted by blueberry to Computers & Internet (3 answers total)

My nonprofit has used Razoo in the past. The benefit of it is that it's not just based on single campaigns--you can run a fundraising campaign, but your page is there permanently to gather donations for the organization. Downside, though, is that if it's a non-US-registered nonprofit, there has to be a US-registered 501(c)(3) sponsoring the group. (See question 4 of the FAQ.) Don't know if that's a setup that would work for you--maybe a church or library could sponsor them?
posted by carrioncomfort at 6:03 AM on April 30, 2015

Response by poster: So, I've been talking with someone at GoFundMe.

Apparently, I can't have the donation page pipe funds directly to the non-profit since the non-profit is based in Nepal (not in the U.S.).

...in that case, you will need to create a Personal campaign. Unfortunately, you will not be able to add their bank account to that type of campaign. You would have to withdraw the funds yourself and send them the funds. Would that still work?

My thinking was that this might open me up to having to pay taxes on any funds received since I was basically "receiving" the donation by me getting the check (or transfer) from GoFundMe, before I then turned around and sent it on to the non-profit's account in Nepal...

GoFundMe replied:

While this is by no means a guarantee, donations on GoFundMe are simply considered to be "personal gifts" which are not taxed as income in the US...

Also, WePay will not report the funds you collected as earned income. If you collect at least $20,000 and have at least 200 transactions in the calendar year, WePay will send you a 1099-K form by January 31st of the following year. The 1099-K form is simply intended to track the movement of funds.

So... A: Yay, this sounds like it could work then, but...

B: how are the IRS not getting their tax from these donations? Are they really just choosing not to take any of it? I thought the IRS liked to tax whatever they possibly could....?

Can anyone enlighten me on that?

I'm just worried that I might get a check from GoFundMe, deposit it and send the non-profit a wire-transfer, and then next April the IRS says "Hey you got and deposited $XXXXX from GoFundMe and so you owe us $XXXX as the tax on that amount you received."
posted by blueberry at 9:58 PM on April 30, 2015

Response by poster: In the end, I did set up a GoFundMe page, but I found that it got a pretty anemic response, so I took it down. Instead, I'm now directing people to relief organizations with established, direct donation-collection pages.

I set up a website where I post a photo every day of someone that I met during my time in Nepal (with a short explanation or story if possible). Below each days photo, I include links to both

• Mercy Corp’s and
• UNICEF’s Nepal earthquake relief funds.

After I publish a new photo to the website, I then post about it on my Facebook account to hopefully direct traffic to the site.

I don't know how much, if any, traffic I'm actually sending to MercyCorps or UNICEF, but as I explain on the site's "About" page:

...I have created this website to share photos to help keep the people of Nepal fresh in people's minds. My plan is to post a new photo every day.

My intent is to show the wonderful people of Nepal—sisters, brothers, fathers, and mothers—so that when people hear “Nepal”, it isn't “disaster” that comes to mind, but rather the faces and stories of wonderful people like Shashi and Sarju.

(If you'd like to see the site, it's listed on my MetaFilter profile page)
posted by blueberry at 3:15 PM on May 30, 2015 [1 favorite]