The Pennies Foundation

The Pennies Foundation, the creator of Pennies the electronic charity box, is developing an eToolkit to enable online retailers to more easily join the micro-donation movement and raise money for charity.

Website: www.pennies.org.uk

Most people are familiar with the idea of dropping change into the charity box sitting on the shop counter. The electronic charity box is exactly the same idea but it works instead when people pay by credit or debit card or electronically. It means that it works just as well for online or high-street shopping.

Pennies makes giving to charity easy and affordable for all: customers can simply press 'YES' to donate on the Chip and PIN machine in-store, or click the 'Donate' button online.  The request is for micro-donations - literally a few pennies (1p-99p). The Pennies Foundation then ensures that the donations are received by the charities named on the virtual tin.

Micro-donations are powerful. There are 43 million card holders in the UK today, and around 1 million card transactions an hour. If the UK's card holders donated a 30p a month, well over £150m would be raised for charity every year. 

Since launch in November 2010 Pennies has generated over 1.8 million micro-donations of which 1.1 million have been made online.

The Award: The Pennies Foundation has been awarded £50,000 to develop an e-Toolkit which will accelerate the adoption of Pennies for smaller online retailers.   Currently the e-Toolkit will include an online registration portal for e-tailers, a plug-in that enables donations to be made and an API to record donations.

Contact

• Liz Kearsley, Marketing and Communications Officer: Liz.Kearsley@pennies.org.uk
• Alison Hutchinson: Chief Executive
• Peter Nugent: Finance Director