What Donors Should Look for in a Charity This Holiday Season
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Two numbers from the same survey sit awkwardly side by side. Trust is essential to 67.7% of U.S. adults before donating, yet just 18.3% report high trust in charities, according to BBB’s Give.org 2026 Donor Trust Report. That distance between wanting to trust and actually trusting does not disappear in November and December. It gets tested by mailers, inbox appeals, checkout prompts and text messages that can all land before lunch.
For U.S. donors, many of those appeals come from charities working overseas, in places like Sudan, Djibouti or Ghana, where a donor cannot see the work firsthand. Knowing what to look for in a charity turns that uncertainty into a short list of checks, each one answerable in a few minutes from home. The six below run from confirming a charity is registered with the IRS to judging whether it will report back after the gift.
>> Related Post: What is Donation Matching? How to Double Your Impact with ARCD
Things to Check Before Choosing a Charity This Holiday Season:
1. Check That the Charity Is Registered
Scammers follow the news as closely as donors do. The IRS placed fake charities third on its 2026 Dirty Dozen list of tax scams, warning that they exploit tragedies and disasters to collect both donations and personal information. Seasonal appeals often lean on the year’s emergencies, and a familiar-sounding name proves little, since lookalike groups borrow words like “relief,” “children” and “fund” from organizations donors already recognize.
The check itself takes two minutes. Ask for the charity's full legal name and its Employer Identification Number (EIN), then search either one on the IRS Tax Exempt Organization Search to confirm it is eligible to receive tax-deductible gifts. If the name on the payment page does not match the IRS record, pause before giving.
2. Give Through the Charity's Own Website
Requests now arrive through texts, social feeds, forwarded emails and shared fundraising pages, and not all of them start with the charity they mention. A safer habit is to treat the message as a reminder rather than a doorway. Close it, type the charity's web address yourself, and give through its own site or a donation page it links to directly.
A few details are worth a second look before you give:
- A request to pay with gift cards, a method that is hard to trace and almost impossible to reverse.
- Unexpected requests for wire transfers. Confirm the payment instructions through the charity's independently verified website or phone number before sending money.
- A web address that is slightly off from the charity's usual site, such as an extra word or an unfamiliar ending.
3. Ask for Details Behind Urgent Appeals
December appeals run on deadlines: a match that expires at midnight, a goal that is almost met, a last chance before the year closes. Some of that urgency is genuine, because charities really do plan budgets around year-end giving. The useful question is whether the urgency arrives with details. A real matching offer can usually tell you who is providing the match, how much is left in it and what happens to gifts that come in after it runs out.
Employer matching works differently. Many companies match employee gifts, but each sets its own rules, forms and deadlines, so the answers sit with your HR team rather than in the appeal. Asking before you give, rather than after, keeps a match from missing a company cutoff.
4. Read What Each Gift Option Covers
Gift catalogs turn donations into objects: a food bag, a month of care, a school year. Those descriptions help, but they can mean two different things. Sometimes a gift buys that exact item. Often it reflects the typical cost of a program, and the money joins a larger pool that also covers the transport, staff and follow-up that make the item useful.
Neither approach is wrong, as long as the charity is clear about which one it uses. Look for wording that spells out what a gift covers and how the program runs. ARCD's orphan sponsorship program, for example, breaks its support into monthly cash help for a child's guardian, regular check-ins from a social worker and school supplies. That level of detail lets you picture the work behind the price, which tells you more than any photograph.
5. Look for Results You Can Verify
A charity's own website carries real weight in the decision. Among the survey participants who look for information before giving, 54% said research on the charity's website influences them, and 39% pointed to information from third-party charity monitors. That puts real weight on what a charity publishes, so read its impact page the way a reporter would. Strong pages define their numbers, separating people who received a service directly from neighbors who benefit from a shared well or clinic, and they say over what period the totals were counted.
Outside records help confirm what the website claims. A U.S. charity's Form 990 shows its income, spending and leadership, and a transparency seal or rating carries more weight when it links to a profile you can open rather than sitting as an image on a donation page. If the website and the outside records tell different stories, ask the charity to explain the gap.
6. Choose a Charity That Reports Back
Fewer people are giving to charities than a few years ago, according to sector data. The Fundraising Effectiveness Project, a collaboration between the Association of Fundraising Professionals Foundation for Philanthropy and GivingTuesday, found that donor counts fell 3.6% in 2025 even as total dollars grew, extending a decline that began in 2021. Woodrow Rosenbaum, GivingTuesday's chief data officer, put it plainly: the sector is "serving fewer donors for the fifth consecutive year."
The 3.6% donor-count decline does not show why individual donors stopped giving. Clear follow-up helps donors assess what their gift supported and decide whether to stay involved. Look for a charity that shares progress during the year, lets you decide how often it contacts you and has a privacy policy explaining how your details are handled.
>> Related Post: Why the Holiday Season is a Time to Give Back to Those in Need
ARCD's Record on What to Look for in a Charity
Africa Relief and Community Development (ARCD) is a U.S. 501(c)(3) nonprofit, EIN 46-2568671, working across 32 African countries through six programs: Orphan Sponsorship, WASH, Education, Healthcare, Food & Nutrition and Empowerment. Its Form 990 is public, and its Candid profile carries the 2026 Platinum Seal of Transparency. Employer gifts can be matched using the details on its donation matching page.
On the ground, ARCD's programs have built more than 2,900 water wells across Africa through its water well appeal. Children in its orphan sponsorship program are supported within their own families rather than placed in orphanages. The winter appeal centers on two needs: food for families facing hunger and family-based care for orphaned children.
>> Donate this Holiday Season. Help ARCD provide food, education, and family-based care to communities across Africa.
FAQs
1. Is a personal crowdfunding page the same as giving to a charity?
Not always. A page set up to help a specific person or family is a gift to individuals, even when it mentions a charity, and the IRS does not treat gifts to individuals as deductible charitable contributions. Pages run by a charity, or built to pay a named charity directly, are a different matter, so check who receives the money before you give.
2. What should a holiday donation receipt include?
A useful receipt shows the charity's legal name, the date and amount of your gift, and whether you received anything in return, such as an event meal or a thank-you item. A qualifying gift made in 2026 may count for the 2026 tax year, subject to IRS rules and your circumstances, so file the receipt with your 2026 tax records.
3. Can I donate in someone's name as a holiday present?
Yes. Many charities let you dedicate a gift to a friend or relative and send them a card or email about it. The receipt and any tax deduction stay with the person who paid, not the person being honored.
4. Can I choose which ARCD program my holiday gift supports?
Yes. The donation form lets you pick a specific program or campaign, such as orphan care or clean water. Choosing the general fund instead lets ARCD direct the gift to its most urgent priorities.
