Make donations go further

There are several ways you can give to charity this Christmas and beyond

If you plan to donate to charity this year, make sure the recipient can make the most of your generosity. The simplest way to give your charity donation a boost is to add Gift Aid. When you donate, you tick the box to add Gift Aid and the charity can claim tax relief on what you give. This means they can claim back from HMRC the basic rate of income tax that you paid on the money you donated. So, if you give £10 the charity gets £12.50. But in order to add Gift Aid to your donation you must have paid income tax on the money. If you earned less than the Personal Allowance – £12,570 – and don’t therefore pay income tax – you can’t claim Gift Aid. If you do, HMRC can ask you for a refund on the Gift Aid they paid on your behalf. However, if you pay more income tax because you are a higher- or additional-rate taxpayer, you can claim even more tax back. When you fill out your tax return you can get back the extra tax – 20% for a higherrate taxpayer and 25% for additional-rate payers. It is up to you if you then give that extra cash to charity. If you don’t fill out a tax return, call HMRC on 0300 200 3300 and declare your donations so your tax code can be adjusted.

Be sure to use your loyalty points

You can also help by donating your loyalty points. Nectar card holders can donate their points to a range of charities, from Macmillan to the RSPCA via Crowdfunder. Tesco Clubcard holders can give their Clubcard vouchers to charities and food banks through the Tesco website. Anyone who shops at Marks & Spencer can sign up for a Sparks card and every time you shop the retailer will donate to your chosen charity. So, your big Christmas food shop could help a charity.

If you’re still doing some lastminute gift shopping online you can donate to charity while you shop. Use a charity portal such as Give as you Live, The Giving Machine, or Easyfundraising and click from that site to the retailer you want to shop with, such as Amazon, John Lewis or Argos, and the retailer will donate part of what you spend to your chosen charity.

Online-shopping websites pay other sites, such as search engines and voucher-code sites, a commission when they direct the customer to their site. These charity portals simply give part of that commission to charity. For example, if you shopped at LookFantastic via The Giving Machine, 3.5% of what you spent would be donated to the charity of your choice.

If you want to support a charity year-round, rather than just at Christmas, give via your wages. Give As You Earn takes donations from your wages before income tax is deducted. So your charity gets a regular income and it costs you less. If you are a basic-rate taxpayer and you want to give £50 to charity each month, £40 would be taken from your pay packet and £10 would come from the tax you would otherwise have paid to HMRC.