WIN $1000!

Now live on

Charities Overcoming Challenges

September 21, 2020

Overcoming the current challenges facing charities

In many ways, fintechs are made to help people in need. Companies like Square, Mercado Libre, and M-Pesa make financial products more affordable and accessible. They’ve improved billions of lives.

As there are now more than 3.5 billion smartphone users across the globe, fintechs are helping people in need on every continent. Fintech has been especially impactful in countries where there is a large unbanked or underbanked population, such as India, Kenya, and Brazil. 

While fintechs are innovating successfully, as the recent bushfire crisis in Australia highlighted, charities are facing many challenges. Despite their noble intentions, they still face many real-world challenges.  

In this article, we examine how our new financial technology can help charities overcome those obstacles and make an even greater impact. 

YouPay lets you pay for someone in need. If they send a link with the item they need, you can pay for it with a click. It’s 100% free for charities. 

Current challenges faced by charities

As the Australian bushfires wrought havoc across the country, thousands upon thousands of Aussies wanted to help. They opened up their wallets and their pantries to support those in need. However, these Aussies and the charities they donated to face ongoing challenges. Moreso, they exemplify a set of concerns seen across the entire charity sector. 

1. Restrictions preventing donations from going to where they’re needed most

Comedian Celeste Barber set out to raise $50,000 for the NSW Rural Fire Service and Brigades Donation Fund. The response was incredible. With support from “The kids who smashed their piggy banks open” to “Single mums that gave what they could”, they raised $51.3 million. 

As the donations soared past $50,000, people assumed their donations would be spread out across a range of organisations to help all of those in need. However, courts ruled that the money could only go to the charities initially nominated. Despite the donor’s intentions, laws prevented the funds from going where they would make the greatest impact. 

2. Public hesitation to donate money 

The unwillingness of individuals to donate money directly to a homeless person because they worry about how they will spend it has been well documented. However, that attitude is spreading beyond individuals and towards the entire charity sector. 

In response to the fires, the Red Cross collected $216 million, St Vincent de Paul accepted $22.9 million, and the Salvation Army received $43 million. While most fires were contained by mid-February, half of those donations were yet to be distributed to those in need by June—$111 million, $22.4 million, and $13.5 million respectively. 

As many of the victims were living in tents and caravans as they waited for assistance, the NSW Emergency Services Minister David Elliott said, “This is not a time for us to delay, particularly while people are hurting so much.” With charities taking a long-term approach to distributing the donations, it isn’t only making people more reluctant to ask for help—it’s making people more hesitant to donate in the first place. 

3. Inability to process food and clothing donations

It’s natural for people wanting to donate actual goods, especially given the above issues with money. When you give a specific item, you know how it will be used. It’s more personal too.

However, during the fires, there were so many food and clothing donations in Victoria that the Premier actually had to ask for people to stop donating, “We don’t need any more clothes, food, trucks on our roads, we don’t have the warehouse capacity, the people or the time to sort through.”

The issue isn’t that charities don’t want food and clothing, it’s that they can only accept a given amount of the same item. More to the point, collecting specific items in short-supply has proven the most challenging.

Overcoming those challenges with YouPay

Firstly, what’s YouPay? YouPay is a safe, secure, and free way to let someone else pay for you. In the case of charitable donations, it lets you pay for somebody in need. 

As smartphones, tablets, and computers have become universal, they create an easy way for charities and individuals in need (recipients) to communicate directly with public and private benefactors (payers)—requesting exactly what they need. 

Here’s how YouPay can help charities and people in need:

  1. The recipient selects items they need.
  2. The recipient shares the YouPay link with the payer. 
  3. The payer checks and approves the purchase. 
  4. The payer makes the payment. 
  5. The order is shipped to the recipient. 

That’s how YouPay works. But it’s the impact we make that matters most. Charities are already doing incredible work. If we can make the process 1% better it will still make a massive impact. Specifically, we believe YouPay can help overcome the three key obstacles outlined above. 

1. Ensure donations go where they are needed most

When you donate using a YouPay link, you’ll know that you’re donating something they really need, right now. For example, if the NSW Rural Fire Service required 50 breathing apparatus, they could create 50 links and individuals could pay for them directly. Once the Rural Fire Service received everything they needed, individuals could focus on helping other organisations and people in need. 

2. Give directly without the need for cash

With the issues surrounding financial donations, many people want to donate items directly. This is easy with a YouPay link. A charity or individual selects what they need and shares a YouPay link with people looking to help. For example, during the bushfires many affected people wanted to build themselves a shed immediately. It would have been easy for donors to pay for the materials they needed. 

3. Ensures people in need get exactly what they require

While charities had stopped taking general donations of food and clothing during the bushfire crisis, they were still requesting specific items, including bottled water, UHT milk and pet food. A YouPay link would help charities to collect the exact items they are short of. Furthermore, a family in need could request a hamper of grocery items and another family could directly pay for it. 

Aussies will always be there to help out their mates. What is more, 21st-century technology allows us to have a much larger impact on the lives of many more people—regardless of where they live. 

We hope charities can leverage our technology to help those in need, in Australian and across the globe. Needless to say, YouPay is 100% free for charities.

More insights

& research

YouPay wins at WeMoney Business Awards

YouPay has been awarded Best Innovation in Merchant Experience and a second-place finish in Merchant Payments Provider of the Year at the 2022 WeMoney Business Awards.

My Room and YouPay launch YouPay Giving

My Room has partnered with YouPay to let cancer-affected families shop online and donors pay for their orders at the checkout.

YouPay officially launches cart sharing for US ecomm stores

YouPay, the world first cart sharing app to be approved on Shopify today announced the launch of its cart sharing app into the US market.

Become a YouPay merchant​

& double your sales​

Do you want to offer YouPay to your customers? Get in touch today.

Terms & Conditions

YouPay Valentines Day 2023 Promotion Terms & Conditions:

  • The ‘Promoter’ is YouPay Pty Ltd (ABN 70 644 120 990) of registered office address: 15b 10 Old Chatswood Road, Springwood QLD 4127, Australia. Promotion ends 16.10.22 at 2359 AEST.
  • Employees of the Promoter, their family members or anyone else connected in any way with the competition shall not be permitted to enter the promotion.
  • YouPay carts generated between 0900 AEST 30 January, 2023 and 2359 AEST 14 February receive entries into the Promotion.
  • The recipient of the prize is the person who created the YouPay cart, the ‘Shopper’.
  • For Shopper to receive an entry, the cart must be paid for.
  • The number of entries a Shopper receives is as follows:
    • Pink Kimberly: 100 entries
    • Beserk: 10 entries
    • Honey Birdette: 10 entries
    • Edible Beauty: 10 entries
    • Playful Promises: 10 entries
    • Secret Bottle: 10 entries
    • Grazing Lane Sweets: 10 entries
    • All other merchants that offer YouPay: 1 entry
  • Prizes are listed at https://youpay.co/valentinesday23/
  • The number of entries a Shopper accrues increases their likelihood of winning.
  • Winners are drawn randomly and there are no guarantees that a large number of entries will automatically win you a prize.
  • Prize winners will be drawn at automatically at 15b 10 Old Chatswood Road, Springwood QLD 4127.
  • Announcement of winners: Winners will be notified by email within 3 days of the prize draw. If a prize winner cannot be contacted or does not claim a prize within 28 days of the prize draw after multiple attempts of communication, the Promoter reserves the right to redraw the prize and allocate a new prize winner.
  • The Promoter reserves the right to cancel or amend the competition and these terms and conditions without notice in the event of a catastrophe, war, civil or military disturbance, act of God or any actual or anticipated breach of any applicable law or regulation or any other event outside of the Promoter’s control.
  • The Promoter reserves the right to investigate entries that appear to be fraudulent. Winning entries found to be fraudulent will be ineligible to claim their Prize and reassigned to the next eligible entrant.
  • The Promoter is not responsible for inaccurate prize details supplied to any entrant by any third party connected with this competition.
  • No cash alternative to the prizes will be offered. The prizes are not transferable.
  • Any personal data relating to winners or any other entrants will be used solely in accordance with current Australian data protection legislation and will not be disclosed to a third party without the entrant’s prior consent.
  • Prize winners agree to have their name published in a digital capacity as part of the Promoter’s competition winner announcements.
  • This promotion is in no way sponsored, endorsed or administered by, or associated with, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter or any other Social Network. You are providing your information to the Promoter and not to any other party.

YouPay Wish Lists

all your carts in one place​

Fill your cart

at any YouPay store

Tap the YouPay button to create a shareable cart that’s automatically added to your YouPay Wish List.

Activate your list

to start sharing

Tap Activate your wish list or head to youpay.me to access your unique, shareable YouPay Wish List.

Share your list

you shop, they pay

Get the items you want and make gifting simple by building and sharing your YouPay Wish List today.

New to Youpay?

Shopped with YouPay before?

Hi there.

Want to get in touch?

Drop us a line