United Way and PAC contributions

[gooddecisions]

Does your employer "strongly recommend" you contribute a percentage of your salary to United Way and the political action committee? My employer has an annual campaign and it's voluntary to contribute; however, contributing 0% doesn't really seem acceptable.

I don't really support PACs and private public partnerships in theory. It seems to encourage corruption. Though, I understand that the corporate lobbyist are in place to help convince law makers what benefits or hurts the corporation and to act accordingly. And, it's in your best benefit for your employer to come out ahead.

Some practices at United Way have also repulsed me over the years which makes me prefer to contribute to other charities with less overhead.

[TD2K]

We are encouraged to consider supporting the United Way but the 'encouragement' is a long way from the extent that someone is going to show up at your door asking why you haven't.

At least in my company, there is a lot of pressure to be seen as a good corporate citizen and support United Way not only from the community but from the companies we do business with. I did not contribute this year though I have in the past. Although I can designate my contribution goes to the group I would normally support I object to United Way deducting 15% for their "handling" fee.

[TD2K]

We have a company PAC also but that's even more low key. I've seen a couple of emails telling us about it but that's it.

[Deleted]

There is currently an ongoing "fight" (now lawsuit) between the state legislature and the teachers' professional organization, which has a strong PAC. They have made it illegal for our dues to be payroll deducted if the purpose is "political." Of course, the purpose is political; we only get raises through an act of the legislature.

Meanwhile, AAA, the United Way, the Credit Union and everyone else can have a piece of my paycheck through payroll deduction.

This is Alabama's version of "kill the union." Right now there is an injunction to allow them to continue collecting. They offered to pay the expense, if that was the issue. It isn't.

I'll admit that I resent AAA getting access to employees when our professional organization can't.

[Deleted]

15% for a designation does not sound right TD. It is usually a set fee of $6 or $12 no matter what the designation amount is.

[TrixAre4Kids]

My company pushes United Way really hard. I am non-management so I don't kowtow but the managers are pretty much forced expected to.

[Deleted]

In my last company (about 2 1/2 years) I was somewhat expected/pressured to contribute to it and hated it. I did $10/per paycheck, so was about $40/month.

My current job passes the forms out every year but you are not pressured to contribute. So I haven't been contributing in the past 2 years.

I've met employees at both jobs that contribute to the United Way yet put nothing in their 401K.

[Elizabeth]

Oh yes. I have had a % of my paycheck deducted for the last few years. Plus, we have a ton of fundraising events for them ALLLLL the time. Like a sales team makes breakfast for the office for $5 a plate, and all proceeds go to UW, or raffle tickets for some crappy prize. The area vice president is a board member, so you're pretty much a piece of crap if you don't participate.

[cronewitch]

I've met employees at both jobs that contribute to the United Way yet put nothing in their 401K.

We have several of those. One doesn't need to put money away for retirement because his family is rich, his kids in college and parents just died. He and his late father's trust funds own a big percentage of the company. He contributes about 35-40 a paycheck and increase every year.

They don't even give me the form anymore. Officers give, chairman of the board gives as much as all employees combined and union workers give about 50 a week for about 80 people. The union people can't be in our 401K.

[Deleted]

Mar 27, 2011 23:00:08 GMT -5 cronewitch said:

We have several of those. One doesn't need to put money away for retirement because his family is rich, his kids in college and parents just died. He and his late father's trust funds own a big percentage of the company. He contributes about 35-40 a paycheck and increase every year.

In his case he can afford it, but those other folks with no trust frunds, retirement accounts or life insurance policies should be worrying about themselves first before contributing to the United Way.

[rileyoday]

My ex worked for federal DOJ. They wanted 100 % particapation . My ex would not contribute because they gave to ****.
The warden had her to the office to ask why then applied some pressure. She said your way over the line to even ask me why and have me in your office.

That got around also. They had about 500 staff there.

[azphx1972]

We have United Way campaign drives and a company PAC. I don't participate in either. IMO it's kind of hypocritical for employers to ask their employees to give away their hard earned money. I mean most of them are not working so they can give it away, and if they were they probably wouldn't be working at their current jobs, and would probably pick different charities. I prefer to donate on my own outside of my job, I don't like to mix charity and work.

[bimetalaupt]

MY firm owned a home health care firm and when the United Way asked me why I would not collect for them I told them if my employee wanted to give that was up to time but you are my compaction. Your money has not destinations and you have a past of sporting things like PP and *****.. I do not..

He got upset.. Should have asked for 15% collection fee... You talk about overhead and fancy office. I told him I would not meet him in their high priced sales pitch abode!!
I will not talk about how they were dressed.. Million Dollar wages and
just a thought, ;D
Bruce

[TD2K]

Later, let me see if I can confirm the percentage. It was on the donation form handed out this year or we were told that during one of the dog and pony shows and that's what I thought I remembered.

I just checked the UW website, it has a 'click and give' and that has a disclaimer that the minimum donation is $10 and they keep 3.99% of the donation, minimum $1.

[skubikky]

My company strongly encourages participation in the United Way campaign. Even if an employee is not going to contribute, they want us to go on the website, and in previous years, fill out the card with a 0% donation just to indicate that we've been counted.
I prefer not to contribute to charities via the UW, as I'm capable of donating and directing my contributions on my own. Don't need to incur the administrative cost of the UW.

I also refuse to fill out any card or online registration form. I consider it a privacy issue and don't care how that reflects on the company. Charity is voluntary and private.

[skubikky]

"so you're pretty much a piece of crap if you don't participate. "

It's one of the adult forms of peer pressure. I never concede on this issue. I also don't have a lot of confidence in the UW. High admin costs.

DH and I give a good amount each year to church and other charities. It's a private matter that I consider personal and don't talk about. If my company is going to judge me on this, so be it. Fact is they don't.

[Deleted]

Mar 28, 2011 6:53:51 GMT -5 skubikky said:

My company strongly encourages participation in the United Way campaign. Even if an employee is not going to contribute, they want us to go on the website, and in previous years, fill out the card with a 0% donation just to indicate that we've been counted.
<snip>I also refuse to fill out any card or online registration form. I consider it a privacy issue and don't care how that reflects on the company. Charity is voluntary and private.

We have the same system. I do sign on and I even donate $100 to a women's shelter, but we donate far more to that shelter outside of UW.

What really bothers me is that our Matching Gifts Program (Company donates whatever you donated to most charities) is through an on-line "tool" run by- the United Way! So UW has all the info about where else you donated and how much. I finally caved in and applied for matches of what we'd donated to the women's shelter. Fortunately, UW has not sent me solicitations since I've made the requests- if they do, I will send them a blistering letter.

[zibazinski]

As a former teacher, we not only were pressured as they want 100% participation but once we got forms already made out including our social security number printed on it!!! That raised such a privacy stink that the pressure ceased. Form in our boxes, we could throw it out if we wished.

[TD2K]

Social security numbers are one on my pet peeves. One of our clients uses your SS number as an ID number. You just about can't use the bathroom without providing it. Another client did also till they emailed a SS to the various contractors with everyone's SS number left on it, that caused a stink and they suddenly realized they really shouldn't be tracking these and stopped.

We had another client that wanted us to sign blanket releases so they could essentially get anything they wanted about you from anyone. I refused to sign it, told my employer they could find another lead engineer for the project and the client finally backed off.

Okay, I'll end my hijacking of this thread.

[Havoc]

A few years ago I worked for a firm that "highly encouraged" participation in the annual UW campaign. Don't know if they still do this, but at the time UW gave out sponsor designations to companies based upon the participation level of their employees(silver, gold, platinum), and our firm wanted to get to the next level. We weren't required to, but the managing partner of the office had a list of people who didn't and would personally visit people to encourage them to enroll in the payroll deduction donation. I thought it a little over the top that a guy making several million a year was visiting people making 30-40k to "encourage" them to donate. Then a string of scandals hit UW (including out of control expenses, million dollar salaries for board members, etc), and the firm had the good grace not to strong-arm the donations the following years...

[Deleted]

Mar 28, 2011 8:01:24 GMT -5 Havoc said:

Then a string of scandals hit UW (including out of control expenses, million dollar salaries for board members, etc), and the firm had the good grace not to strong-arm the donations the following years...

Yeah, that happens. My brother stopped UW campaigns in his office after one of the local scandals over a million-dollar executive comp package. I was with a sub of Prudential when an earlier scandal hit. Pru would tell you what your "fair share" was (at middle management level it was 1% of your salary) and really put pressure on those who didn't give that much. They switched to a payroll deduction that could apply to any 501(c)(3) organization. (Essentially any organization for which the IRS lets you deduct your donations.) That was wonderful.

[azphx1972]

Ugh. If they'd only use some of those pressure tactics to get people to contribute to their 401Ks instead.

[whoisjohngalt]

My first full time job out of college was for an insurance company that had an annual UW campaign. I don't like being forced to donating to charities, so I didn't.

However, I like to volunteer, so I called a few UW places to ask how I can volunteer. Well, they told me that I will most likely have to go through a two week training program, which was 9-5 daily. I thought they were joking. So, I told them that I guess they are either looking for unemployed or rich housewifes, bc having a full time job and only 2 wks vacation/yr I wasn't about to spend them going through their training.

I later found an organization that did training at night. I volunteered for them for years before we moved away.

Lena

[Deleted]

Mar 28, 2011 9:46:49 GMT -5 azphx1972 said:

Ugh. If they'd only use some of those pressure tactics to get people to contribute to their 401Ks instead.

You can say that again... if they put as much effort in my current company into getting people to sign up for the 401K as they do getting UW contributions, I am sure we would have more than the 20% participation rate that we have now.

Yes, only 20% of the people that are eligible for the 401K actually participate ( and not even enough to get full match) compared to 82% UW contribution rate last year.

See something wrong with that picture?

[TD2K]

Later, I emailed the local UW office and got the following reply:

For donor designations to other non-profits a one-time contribution by cash or check has a 14% administrative fee that we keep.

[xia]

My company is also pushing united way like there’s no tomorrow.
$1 out of each paycheck is all they get, I figured I rather “donate” the minimum then be “on notice”.

[Deleted]

Mar 28, 2011 22:43:18 GMT -5 TD2K said:

Later, I emailed the local UW office and got the following reply:

For donor designations to other non-profits a one-time contribution by cash or check has a 14% administrative fee that we keep.

Holy Cow! That's terrible! It isn't the case at the UW's up here.

[sheilaincali]

When I was active duty Air Force they pushed hard for 100% participation into an annual contribution drive. The UW was pushed heavily but they were required to have a booklet available that had all of the overhead percentages in it. So we would go through and find anything to do with women/kids or animals that had every low overheads and donate to them.
If you didn't donate you had a meeting with the Colonel. Which was a little extreme in my opinion. You have a bunch of airman that qualify for WIC and you are going to tell them they have to donate as much as the officers and civilians we worked with making more than 3 times what we made?
I always donated the bare minimum.

Now I work for a very small office. We don't have anything like that but my mom (my dad owns the company) is the chairperson for the local Relay for Life so she sells daffodils here (gently and pressure free) and encourages people to stop by the Relay but that's about it.

[commentator]

I believe it is a violation of law to coerce (or attempt to coerce) employees into making political contributions. The line is fuzzier when it comes to charitable contributions.

[TD2K]

Holy Cow! That's terrible! It isn't the case at the UW's up here.

Which is why I decided not to donate to them this year and just make my donation directly to the organization of my choice.