this is a commercial site so why not....

[x11]

use the secure transaction facilities to create an account for people from anywhere in the world that want to make a money donation to members/causes that are in need of financial support for whatever reason.

explanation - there are a lot of posts that have come along re abuse cases, medical cases...etc that i would love to make a small voluntary donation toward but because a lot are just private folks they do not have a mechanism to easily forward a voluntary donation to, most are not even looking or asking for money but if there was an easy way to just sling them $50 or something i would really like to at times 9it all adds up), posting directly into their private bank account obviously could be done but nobody is going to provide such details to the public unless they are from nigeria. i am computer illiterate mostly so i may be missing the point but i don't do facebook, e-bay or anything and don't know much about this stuff.

just a thought and i will repeat the word voluntary.

[Castlemaid]

I'm often very moved by the generosity and help members are willing to offer up. People's hearts are in the right place, but the board has a strict no-solicitation rule. Unfortunately, people have, in the past, come on the board with terrible stories of how they need help for their dog, and scammed members out of thousands of dollars.

Or even long-term members that everyone thought were completely above board, have a personal life crisis, and people were donating only to find out it was all a sham carefully planned out to play on people's sympathies.

So the board's official stance is no solicitations of any kind, and setting up a secure account to allow people to donate money through the board would be against the rules in place.

If people want to help, they need to do so privately, and I would caution against donating directly to an individual. They can donate to a registered rescue, their local shelter, and a number of legit organizations that help people in need to defray the costs of pet medical care and other cost.

I think IMOM is such an organization, as an example: IMOM Home

Opening the door to allow donations through the board is, unfortunately, an open invitation for scammers.

[JakodaCD OA]

I agree with Lucia and just want to reiterate, tho your hearts are in a good place, know who your donating to. Unfortunately there are scammers out there, I would only donate, to a private person via their vet's facility unless I knew them personally...Rescues, can easily be checked out to see if they are legitimate or not.

[JeanKBBMMMAAN]

That is exactly it.

Two additional points -
If you were to donate to a person via their vet, you need to google and check to make sure that the number they give you is actually the vet office - get the name of the vet themselves, the office name, address, fax number, etc - because there are ways that people set it up so that a friend is the vet office, gets your credit card #, etc:

The Latex Salesman (Seinfeld) - YouTube

The Latex Salesman (Seinfeld) - YouTube

And honestly rescues need to be checked really well - people think they are okay, but if you read the "Do You Know Where That Dog is Going" thread stickied in general rescue section, you will see rescues are included in those bad places and a more recent one was taking money from people on this board who thought they were helping - turns out none of that money was going to help in the treatment of the dogs. Again, with that, you can direct donations directly to the rescue vet (using the same precautions) but I like to get the vet reference first, asking them how many dogs have been treated, for what, how are the animals in the rescues' care, etc and any rescue should release ALL their vets to give that information to you. Now, if they are only vetting half of their animals...

Which is why donating to a place like IMOM is ideal - all the screening has been done by them, and payments go directly to them, and then they send the total via a check to the vet office that is completing the lifesaving procedure. Since IMOM started in 1998-2010, they have paid $1,443,566 to vet offices for pets in need - but there is no "IMOM" that has money, that million and a half dollars was donated by individuals in amounts as small as $2 at a time.

[x11]

wow, thanks for the explanation, what is up with people that they would even think of such scams??

i sincerely hope folks here don't think i joined the board as some kind of elaborate scam? for all my misgivings as a person i certainly aint no scammer.

[JeanKBBMMMAAN]

Not at all! Glad you asked.

[JakodaCD OA]

no you asked a reasonable question, one I'm sure that's been asked before..

There have been a couple of scams in the past here, thats' why it's soooo important to know who you are donating to , again hearts in the right place, but unfortunately there are scammers out there!