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Unauthorized Nonprofit Donation Pages After GoFundMe with Sarah Saadian

· 27 min · S7 E76

Episode Unauthorized Nonprofit Donation Pages After GoFundMe with Sarah Saadian

0:00 27:20

Carolyn Woodard explores the ethics of online fundraising platforms with Sarah Saadian, Senior Vice President of Public Policy and Campaigns at the National Council of Nonprofits. Hundreds of platforms now solicit and collect donations in the names of nonprofits, often without asking first, and with AI a new one can appear almost overnight.

The issue came to a head in October 2025, when GoFundMe created fundraising pages for 1.4 million nonprofits without their consent, then removed them after an uproar from the sector. In response, the National Council of Nonprofits worked with state associations of nonprofits to publish four principles for ethical online fundraising platforms. Fifty-two state and regional associations endorsed the principles on day one, and about a dozen platforms have signed on since, starting with Every.org.

Sarah walks through each principle and shares what surprised her most: consent matters to donors as much as it does to nonprofits. She holds that nonprofits deserve the same protections as restaurants and hotels have from delivery and booking platforms, and ends with what nonprofits and donors can do right now.

If you are weighing Giving Tuesday fundraising platforms this year, this conversation covers what to look for: consent, transparent fees, and a partner whose business model matches your values.

Sarah and Carolyn discuss:

• The four principles: nonprofit consent, transparency, partnership, and accountability. Consent comes first, because nonprofits need control over their name, logo, branding, and message before anyone raises money on their behalf. • Why consent protects donors too. When a platform has no relationship with the charity, a gift may be held until more donations come in, sent to a similar nonprofit instead, or never arrive at all, and a donor who has a bad experience is hard to win back. • Why opting out is not a workable answer. A local food bank with 15 employees cannot monitor hundreds of websites and fight to get its listing removed from each one, so the burden belongs on platforms to ask first. • How other sectors solved this. The National Restaurant Association reached an agreement with meal delivery platforms, and hotels did the same with Expedia and other booking sites, so only businesses that consent are listed. • What can happen now. State attorneys general can act under existing consumer protection and charitable solicitation laws, nonprofits can endorse the principles, and donors can go to a nonprofit's own website or ask how it prefers to receive gifts.

Resources Mentioned:

• Principles for Ethical Online Fundraising Platforms, National Council of Nonprofits • Endorse the Principles, National Council of Nonprofits • California Attorney General Cease and Desist Order to Flipcause

_______________________________ Start a conversation :)

• Register to attend a webinar in real time, and find all past transcripts at https://communityit.com/webinars/ • email Carolyn at cwoodard@communityit.com • on LinkedIn • on reddit/r/nonprofitITmanagement • on the Community IT website

Thanks for listening.

Links in the notes 7

Transcript

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