Frequently Asked Questions | ||||
| GENERAL 1) What is Kisses That Count? Kisses That Count is a charitable organisation that aims to spread love around the world through the sending and receiving of virtual Kisses; showing that love does make a positive, tangible difference to the world, and building a global community of people who act because they care. These Kisses represent donations to one of our partner charities projects that reflect our vision of working to end poverty and protect our precious environment. Kisses That Count is a limited company currently applying for full charitable status. 2) How does it work? You need to register on our website to send Kisses. Once registered, you choose one of our Kiss animations or upload one of your own photos/ designs, add a short loving message, choose the charity project you wish to support, choose the Kiss Gallery you wish your Kiss to be displayed in, and pay for your Kiss/es (£1 each). Your Kiss is then uploaded to our Kiss Galleries and is also sent by e-mail to your chosen recipient, should you choose this option. The location of where your Kiss is sent to is logged on our website globe. Each area on our globe that Kisses are sent to will turn from cold blues to warm reds, showing which countries are receiving the most love! 3) What makes you different to other charities and non-profits? • We only fund specific grassroots projects from our partner charities rather than making a general contribution to the charity. This ensures that you know exactly where your money is being spent. • Unlike most other charities and non-profits you have the freedom choose exactly which grassroots charity project you want to support from the range available on our website. • We focus on smaller charity projects that you may not ordinarily hear about. Your money makes a significant difference, and for our overseas projects a small amount of money often goes a long way. • We believe that charities work more effectively and do more good when they share resources and knowledge with each other. We therefore encourage our partner charities to get to know each other and work together for the benefit of those they are working with. • We think it is really important to give you feedback about the progress of our charity projects, so you can get to know them better and see exactly how your love is making a tangible difference. 4) How are you funded? The development of Kisses That Count and the initial contributions to our charity projects have been funded by its founders Heather and Chloe Wolsey-Ottaway, and through its launch event held on 17th November 2006. 10% of all Kiss donations are retained by Kisses That Count in order to assist our running costs. We are currently looking to secure on-going funding support to meet all our running costs and future development through grant making trusts and corporate sponsorship. If you can help us with this please get in touch! 5) What is your vision? Our vision is to build a hopeful future: • to eradicate poverty • to live sustainably • to work toward collective stewardship of our beautiful planet as our primary motivation and activity. It's a fact that all life is intricately interconnected - we now know that protecting the environment and all resources is crucial to our collective survival: we believe that all future development must have sustainability as the core motivation. 6) What is your mission? Our mission is: • to inspire millions of people to send millions of Kisses • to thus create millions of small yet highly effective positive actions that add up to create big changes at grassroots levels • to create a global community who act because they care ‘Kisses' fund carefully selected projects that: • provide opportunities for positive people to fight poverty & injustice • provide key resources which enable the protection of endangered wildlife & pressurised habitats • support sustainable forms of development & effective ways of protecting our shared environment 7) What are your values? We believe that our collective future is being shaped right now - collective cooperation & determined action is the only way for us all to survive and thrive. We believe that every individual is equally valuable and should have equal opportunities. We believe that everything in life is interconnected: so we focus on three areas - people, the environment & wildlife preservation because the issues cannot be separated. We believe that change can only happen when local people believe in, benefit from and ‘own' projects. We believe that charities can work more effectively and do more good when they share resources and knowledge with each other. Crucially, we believe that the power of love makes and will make an unbelievable difference in shaping a hopeful future for us all. THE CHARITY PROJECTS 8) How do you choose your projects? At the heart of each of our partner charities projects is hope, love and change, and standing up to make a difference. They must also reflect our vision of ending poverty and injustice, and change lives in ways that protect our shared environment & champion sustainable technologies. Our charity partners can be based in the UK and/ or abroad, must be registered as a charity in the country/ies where they operate, and not be a proscribed organisation under the Terrorism Act. We will be adding new projects frequently as we grow, so do get in touch if you have a project that fits this criteria! We are particularly looking for projects in South America, the USA/ Canada, Asia and Australia at this time. 9) How does the money get to the projects? Partner charities receive their money and any interest accrued once the project has been funded, or every quarter, whichever is the sooner. The method of payment is work out individually with each charity partner (e.g. payment by bank transfer, wire transfer, bankers cheque etc), in accordance with what is most appropriate for them. 10) Can I get feedback about how my money has been spent? We think it is really important to give you feedback about the progress of our charity projects, so that you can get to know them better and see exactly how your love is making a tangible difference. This feedback will be provided regularly via our website. 11) How do you know that the money given to the projects will be spent appropriately? Our projects have to come from registered charities in order to ensure that your money is safeguarded and used for the purpose it was given for. At present however we also have two charity organisations offering projects that are in the process of their charity registration (Stars of Hope and Carefree). This is an exception, and funding for their projects will be received by them once their charitable status is achieved. In addition, we have an agreement with our partner charities about what specific projects they will use their Kisses That Count funds for, and what outcomes they wish to achieve. This will be monitored and evaluated by Kisses That Count through our feedback mechanisms. 12) What happens if a project receives more funding than it needs? If a project receives more funds than it needs, we will work with the project’s charity to identify an additional similar project that the funds can be used for. We do not anticipate this happening on a regular basis. 13) What happens if a project receives less funding than it needs? If a project receives less funding than it needs, we will agree one of two options with our partner charities: • The charity will seek the additional funds needed from other sources in order to make the project happen. • If only a small proportion of the money needed has been given, we will work with the charity to identify another similar, suitable project to which funds can be allocated. 14) How does my charity become a partner with Kisses That Count? As Kisses That Count grows, with your Kisses making all the difference, we aim to add new People, Environmental and Wildlife projects which will help make the world a better, more beautiful, safer place. At the heart of each of our partner charities projects is hope, love and change, and standing up to make a difference. They must also reflect our vision of ending poverty and injustice, and change lives in ways that protect our shared environment & champion sustainable technologies. Our charity partners can be based in the UK and/ or abroad, must be registered as a charity in the country/ies where they operate, and not be a proscribed organisation under the Terrorism Act. We will be adding new projects frequently as we grow, so do get in touch if you have a project that fits this criteria. We are particularly looking for projects in South America, the USA/ Canada, Asia and Australia at this time. 15) How will I receive the funding for my charity’s projects? Partner charities receive their money and any interest accrued once the project has been funded, or every quarter, whichever is the sooner. The method of payment is work out individually with each charity partner (e.g. payment by bank transfer, wire transfer, bankers cheque etc), in accordance with what is most appropriate for them. MAKING DONATIONS 16) How can I donate to the projects? There are two ways you can donate to the Kisses That Count charitable projects. You can either send Kisses, and choose which project/s your Kiss supports, or donate directly to the projects using the ‘donate now’ button on the relevant project page. 17) What are the methods of payment? Kisses That Count accepts payments made via debit or credit card, or through Paypal. 18) How do I know my donation is secure? All transactions are processed via Paypal, a very secure and private third-party payment system. We do not receive your credit/ debit card numbers, and we will not release your personal information to third parties unless you authorise this. 19) Is there a minimum donation? The minimum donation is £1, which is the price of sending one Kiss. However, we strongly encourage you to buy at least 5 Kisses at a time, as this vastly reduces our transaction charges, and means more money goes directly to the charitable projects we support. For example, buying one Kiss for £1 will cost us 23.4p in transaction charges; 5 Kisses (£5) costs us 37p. You can save up your Kiss credits to send Kisses at other times. So please, consider buying more Kisses at any one time. 20) How much of my money goes direct to the charity project/s I am supporting? 90% of the money you donate, less transaction charges, goes directly to the charity projects you choose to support. Kisses That Count retains 10% of each transaction to help cover our running costs. Thank you for visiting Kisses That Count! | ||||
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