Call for safeguards to protect fundraisers receiving commission payments

With commission-based pay recently deregulated in the UK (and in Australia back in 2021), a new paper by fundraising think tank Rogare re-evaluates the ethics of paying fundraisers in this way, and suggests that safeguards may be needed.

The discussion paper, Playing the percentages: Re-evaluating the ethics of paying fundraisers by commission, looks at 14 regularly deployed ethical arguments against commission payment, finding many of them weak, whilst also raising an additional argument regarding fundraiser wellbeing.

The paper says that ethical arguments warning of possible harm from this form of payment are rarely supported by evidence. Commission can also be singled out as unethical without this ethical reasoning being extended to comparable aspects of fundraising, such as bonus payments. ‘Straw man’ arguments are also often presented – weak positions that are easily argued against, especially that commission is a binary option: it can be paid on all donations received, or on none.

Rogare suggests that many of these traditional ethical arguments against commission are not strong enough to defeat two ethical arguments in its favour: that commission-based pay could result in more money being raised for good causes, and that it enables smaller organisations with little budget to engage in fundraising and compete with larger organisations.

However, Rogare also raises another argument against paying fundraisers commission, which is that if this became commonplace, it could harm fundraisers’ psychological wellbeing.

To protect fundraisers and other stakeholders, Rogare proposes 12 safeguards for when commission payments aren’t covered by fundraising codes of practice. These include undertaking a risk assessment of potential harms, paying commission only when there is demonstrable audit trail between the ask and the gift, and that commission should never be due on unsolicited gifts. Commission should never be part of the remuneration package for salaried fundraising staff working at a nonprofit, and only paid to agency or freelance fundraisers, and it should never be the sole form of remuneration.

Rogare also poses the idea that professional institutes could introduce a permitting scheme that would give permission to organisations to pay commission to fundraisers, providing these safeguards are in place.

Report co-author Heather Hill says:

“The sector needs to do better than saying ‘because the code says so’, when someone asks why commission-based pay is not permitted. ‘It’s unethical because the code says so’ is a response that fails to provide a rationale for the reason the code has taken such a position, and it fails to address situations for which there is no applicable code.

“This conversation is long overdue and we are pleased to offer this paper as a way of jumpstarting critical thinking around the issue.

“But we would like to make it clear that we are neither arguing for not against commission-based pay for fundraisers, only evaluating the ethical arguments for and against.”

Picture by Getty Images on Unsplash+