I’ve found that running a small business inevitably means your name will find its way onto various telemarketing lists of local charities. Often, these non-profits will call you up, read you a script that appeals to your emotions, then ask for a small donation over the phone.

Now, I have no problem with charities asking for money. But I often wonder if the person on the other end is really who they say they are - especially if the call appears as ‘Blocked’ or ‘Not Available’ on my caller id. I’m especially suspicious if I ask for a website and they tell me they don’t have one - or it looks unprofessional.

Besides the potential for fraud, I find that I’m often hesitant to donate via phone for a number of reasons:

- Even after the quick spiel, I still don’t know much about them
- I have no idea what will be done with my donation once they receive it
- There’s a good chance that if I donate, they will ask for donations each quarter

That said, I’ve been trying to come up with a handful of charities I give to on a regular basis because I believe in the cause, not simply because they called asking for a donation and I was feeling charitable at the time. I want to be able to keep up with what the charity is doing and know that

- my donation is being put to good use
- they aren’t wasting funds with high overhead
- they have set goals and are making progress towards them

For those interested in researching charities, Marketwatch had a nifty article this week on how to choose a charity. The advice included looking at websites that provide financial statements (Form 990) like Guidestar.org (which I use from time to time), Charitynavigator.org and Give.org.

They also suggest
- volunteering at the organization
- ask how your donation will be spent
- ask if they’ll allocate your funds to local causes
- consider setting up a ‘donor advised fund’

To that, I’d add
- check out their website, current publications, and your local newspaper archives to see what they’ve been doing recently