Established on November 26, 2006 by actresses Dina Korzun and Chulpan Khamatova. Is a legal entity.
The fund does not have branches, offices or representatives in the regions of Russia. There are two partner funds, one registered in London - Gift of Life, and the second in the USA - Podari.Life.
Initiative group “Donors for Children”
A volunteer association that does not have a permanent membership, legal entity, current accounts or Internet wallets.
Our tasks
- raising funds for the treatment and rehabilitation of children with cancer and hematological diseases;
- assistance to oncology and hematology clinics where children and young adults are treated;
- attracting public attention to the problems of sick children;
- promoting the development of free blood donation;
- providing social and psychological assistance to sick children;
- facilitating the work of volunteer groups at children's oncohematology clinics.
Our story
The fund did not arise from scratch. Its first employees were those who for many years, as volunteers, helped doctors treat children and children get treatment. Once upon a time, the concepts of “pity, mercy, kindness” were considered manifestations of weakness and it was not customary to speak about them out loud. Of course, there have always been people who helped their loved ones and friends, but there was no such charity as a movement - numerous and aimed at helping complete strangers who were in trouble.
Official website Chulpan Khamatova Foundation "Give Life":
The Gift of Life Foundation presented a new mobile donation service - short number 6162. The number was opened together with Beeline; it is also available for MTS and Megafon subscribers. The uniqueness of the number is that Beeline subscribers can subscribe to monthly donations. This is the first such experience for Russia.
The Gift of Life Foundation presented a new mobile donation service - short number 6162. From left to right: Olga Turishcheva (Beeline), Chulpan Khamatova and Dina Korzun
We asked representatives of operators and charitable foundations about how mobile fundraising will develop in Russia.
What is unique about the mobile service of the Gift of Life Foundation?
Beeline subscribers have access to the service of monthly mobile donations - this is the first such experience for Russia. Beeline is negotiating to connect other operators to the monthly donation program.
Sending SMS is free for Beeline and Megafon subscribers. For MTS subscribers - 4 rubles. (until the end of July 2013); MTS also sends a paid SMS message worth 10 rubles for confirmation.
The commission of agents, the provider and the bank in total is only 5% of the payment.
“Helping should be convenient”
The main message with which the Gift of Life foundation created the short number 6162 is “help should be convenient.” As the co-founder of the fund said at the presentation of the service Chulpan Khamatova: “From the very beginning, we were looking for ways to shorten the donation process. So that people don’t stand in line for hours and fill out a bunch of forms. As a result, we realized that the fastest way to help is through a mobile phone transfer. The fund had several attempts to reach an agreement with the operators. For the first time, we were offered the following conditions: 50% for the operator, 50% for the children. “There will be a lot of money, so don’t worry.” We didn’t agree to this, of course. Now, thanks to Beeline, the maximum amount of money transferred goes directly to children.”
Currently, 70% of all donations to Gift of Life come from private donors. Of these, 81% are Sberbank, 12% are online donations, 7% are Qiwi payment terminals. The short issue, according to Chulpan, will make a real revolution and in the future, perhaps, will become the main driving force behind fundraising: “After we launched the program with Beeline, from May 27 to June 25, more than 1 million rubles were collected. Despite the fact that there has been no promotion of the service yet.”
According to Chulpan, the issue is valuable because it allows foundations not to miss the “impulse of sympathy”: “A person is designed like this: he saw a story on TV, read an article - and the impulse is triggered - I want to help! It is very important to catch this moment before a person forgets, before he is distracted. In this regard, SMS donation is an ideal service.”
Dina Korzun, the second co-founder of Give Life, who has been living in London for five years, shared her Western experience of mobile fundraising: “Every charitable foundation in Europe has its own mobile number for donations. Advertisements with these numbers hang on the streets and in the subway. It is part of the everyday life of ordinary Europeans. For example, I transferred 3 pounds, the next day they called me back, said that they had received the money, thanked me and offered to send me an information booklet from the fund. Such services have enormous possibilities. When there was a flood in Haiti, the Red Cross raised $3 million via SMS in 24 hours.”
Monthly donations: regular, but not automatic
Olga Turishcheva, Vice President for Marketing and Business Development at VimpelCom (Beeline), spoke about the key features of the short number 6162:
This is not an automatic debit; the subscriber confirms the payment every month. If suddenly in some month you cannot make a transfer, don’t worry - after a month you will receive a reminder and a question whether you are ready to make a donation again.
It doesn’t matter what operator you have, the short number 6162 for all operators is assigned to the Gift of Life foundation.
Fraudsters cannot connect to the short number; it is completely protected. The subscriber always receives confirmation that he has made a donation. Moreover, if you are an MTS or Megafon subscriber, confirmation will come from your operator.
There is the possibility of targeted assistance to the beneficiaries of the Gift of Life Foundation. For example, there was a story on television about a child, and after that we will allocate donations from the general stream specifically for him - according to the time of translation.
How MTS and Megafon are developing mobile charity
We asked two other Big Three mobile operators, MTS and Megafon, what charitable programs they have and how they see the development of mobile fundraising in Russia.
Anna Smirnova, leading specialist of the MTS public relations department:
About charity USSD request *700#
We are developing a service - USSD request *700#. It can be used free of charge by every MTS subscriber (individuals only). Donations from the subscriber's account go directly to the fund, and, importantly, on the same day they were sent. Unlike regular SMS charity, where donations are received by the fund only after a month.
We are developing this project as part of our “Give Good!” program. together with partner funds: Rusfond, Creation, Center for Humanitarian Programs and the Konstantin Khabensky Foundation. NPOs enter into a direct agreement with one of the providers connected to the Easy Payment service and begin accepting donations. The service provides feedback: funds receive additional information about the donation: the number of the subscriber who transferred the money, the time of transfer.
So far, only the Konstantin Khabensky Foundation has connected to the USSD request; we are waiting for others to join.
About democracy
Cash used to be the most popular form of giving, but mobile and online payments are the future. For example, in the UK, a quarter of the population under the age of 35 send mobile donations at least once a year. This is part of the process of democratizing philanthropy and opens up incredible prospects for foundations: every phone owner can become a philanthropist.
About fraud
We have our own security team that carefully checks every donation request. Our partners from Rosno, if necessary, provide an expert assessment of the treatment prescribed by the doctor and the selection of medications. In addition, partner funds always provide us with reports on the work done, where it is indicated down to the penny where the funds went.
About regular donations
We are not trying to create a regular donation service. Because people tend to forget what they signed up for. As a result, after 2-3 months the subscriber may perceive debits from his personal account as fraud and begin to accuse the operator of illegal debits. In fact, charity is a spontaneous desire; a person is ready to help here and now, and not after some time.
Petr Lidov, director of public relations at MegaFon:
About charitable services
We do not have special charity services. But our subscribers can transfer money to charitable organizations through the MegaFon Money application or on the website www.oplata.megafon.ru. In this case, the commission is 0%.
About fraud
There are two types of mobile charity: in the first case, the subscriber is asked to send an SMS to a short number, after which the amount is debited from his personal account in favor of a charitable organization; in the second, the subscriber transfers any amount of funds to the personal account of the person in need.
In the case of using a short number, we, as an operator, can help the subscriber find out whether the short number is related to a charitable organization, but in the second case this is problematic. If someone announces a charity fundraiser and publishes a Megafon number so that money can be transferred to it, we cannot confirm or deny that it is a scam - as long as there are no complaints from defrauded clients.
How to recognize mobile scammers
If funds are accumulated on a phone number, then standard limits determined by the Law “On the National Payment System” apply to their withdrawal through mobile commerce.
If the owner of the number wants to withdraw a lot of money from the account at once and terminates the contract with the issuance of the remaining amount on the personal account, then we can consider such a statement for up to 60 days to make sure that this is really not fraud and there are no complaints from other subscribers.
There have been precedents when room owners demanded to give out the entire amount at once, explaining this as a charitable fundraiser, but I repeat once again: we check and have the right to issue money with a delay of up to 60 days, so it is better to use other opportunities for charitable fundraisers.
If we come across fraudulent schemes that are disguised as charity, MegaFon notifies subscribers about the appearance of such fraud on our portal stopfraud.megafon.ru and on social networks.
I would like to advise you: to ensure that your money reaches the right recipient, check with the operator whether the SMS to a certain short number really refers to a charity event, and also how much such a message costs.
NPO: experience of mobile charity
Representatives of several charitable foundations told Philanthropist about their experiences in mobile and online charity.
Alexandra Kremenets, curator of the “Healthy Child” program of the “Children’s Houses” charitable foundation for children:
The Healthy Child program exists mainly through private donations. Internet services bring us about 20% of our funds, mobile services - 3%.
The benefactor sends an SMS to a short number, entering the transfer amount. The company that provides this service takes a commission of 5%. The SMS itself is free for donors.
One day, the foundation’s website was hacked and the e-wallet numbers and SMS charity numbers were replaced. Now we are extremely careful about the security of the site and check all information daily.
Vladlena Kalashnikova, head of the fundraising department of the “Mercy” help service.
The share of donations through the mobile service is only 3-4% of the total amount of monthly donations. But now we are moving to a new, more convenient system with a single short number, independent of the services of which operator the subscriber uses. This is a project with the National Charitable Foundation, which provides us with SMS donation services for free.
The SMS itself will be paid; it is also important to consider that not all tariffs allow you to transfer donations.
We receive more than 50% of assistance through Internet services. For example, as part of the “Give Joy for Easter” campaign, we collected 1 million 150 thousand rubles for the beneficiaries of our help service in just 6 weeks.
Vladimir Berkhin, President of the Tradition Foundation:
Most donations come through direct bank transfers, but mobile services only amount to about 100 thousand rubles per month. Fraudsters are not dangerous to us: even by hacking, for example, a fund’s wallet on Yandex or RBC, they will achieve nothing. The wallet is linked to our bank account, and paper documents are needed to change the link.
We are really looking forward to the appearance of charitable tariffs for mobile communications (when, for example, 0.1% goes to the fund).
Marina Zubova, President of the Gulfstream Foundation:
We receive approximately 20% of donations through online services. Through mobile services - 10-15%.
As part of SMS charity, we cooperate with the National Charitable Foundation. He acts as an intermediary between the NPO and the Soyuztelecom operator. Activating the service is free, funds choose a prefix - the word that donors write in SMS. Mobile operators take a certain percentage: Beeline - 4.95%; MegaFon – 6%; "MTS" - 5%. In principle, we are happy, because previously operators took about 50-60% for themselves.
