No Charge!

We are often asked by charities, “Is there a charge for iT4Communities volunteers or services?” The short answer is "There is no charge" - apart from maybe a small amount of travelling expenses for the volunteer. All issues to do with legitimate expenses should always be negotiated and agreed between the volunteer and organisation, before work starts on the project.

The premise on which iT4C is based is that people volunteer their services because they want to help charities without having any commercial interest in the outcome. A key element of iT4C’s popularity with charities is that they trust iT4C because they expect volunteers to make impartial recommendations on what is best for the charity.

In order for us to keep this reputation it is important that not only do our volunteers not have any commercial interest in the outcome of their volunteering work, but also that they are seen not to i.e. that nothing takes place that might cause charities to have doubts about the impartiality of iT4C volunteers.

For this reason it is not appropriate to sell equipment or services to charities where you have done the preliminary consultation as a volunteer, regardless of the value for money you are offering.

If however you are interested in working with charities and you do not wish to exclude the possibility of selling equipment or services as part of your involvement, then there are other options.

The ICT Hub has launched the Suppliers Directory to the voluntary and community sector. So if you are a provider of high quality ICT goods and services to the voluntary and community sector (or you know people who are) then please add a listing. It's FREE for suppliers to get listed, and for the sector to use.

Please visit http://directory.icthub.org.uk/techfinder/icthub/index.cfm and use the "Apply for a Listing" link on the website to enter details of your organisation and the ICT services you provide.

If any iT4C volunteer is in any doubt about our 'No Payment' policy then please contact us at info@iT4Communities.org.uk and also take a look at Why Volunteer page on the main website.

We would be interested in your thoughts on the ethical and practical issues raised here.