Large Donors

What we class as a “large donation”

ShareGift was set up in 1996 to help solve the problems that can be caused by small shareholdings, but we do welcome donations of any size and frequently receive larger donations. For practical purposes at ShareGift, shareholdings worth over £500 are defined as ‘large’, as this is the level where generally it is possible for us to sell the shares straight away and subsequently make donations to charities.

You may wish to donate a larger holding of shares to ShareGift if:

• A charity you support is not set up to accept shares. Many charities, especially smaller charities, are not able to accept share donations as they do not have the expertise or facilities to deal with them.
• You have a complicated share transaction and need help. The ShareGift team has many years of experience in share registration and settlement, and may be able to accept shares other charities or brokers cannot assist you with.
• You wish a number of charities to benefit from the same shareholding. If you were considering splitting a large value share donation between a number of different charities the amount of work and the costs involved for you and the charities may be off-putting. We can accept and act upon any number of charity suggestions. ShareGift also benefits from free stockbroking and custodial services, thanks to the generous support of our partners. 
• You wish to remain anonymous. ShareGift does not fundraise and will only contact you in respect of the donation you wish to make. We do not send unsolicited mailings, and we do not pass on your details to beneficiary charities or any other third party.

How ShareGift handles large donations:

• Our policy is to sell donated shares as soon as we can. We do not take an investment view.
• ShareGift is cause-neutral, meaning that we do not make a judgment on the relative merits of different charities or causes. Instead, we give to the charities and causes that a) donors and supporters suggest to us and b) we identify from time to time through our own research. We do however carry out due diligence on all the charities we support. If there is some reason why we cannot give to a charity you have suggested, we will let you know before we transfer the shares.
• We make donations in round figures, based on a number of factors, including the value we realise for shares and the overall size of the distribution contemplated. We do not sell shares and pass on the exact proceeds to beneficiary charities, nor do we take any kind of commission from the value of the shares. As a significant proportion of other donations that we receive come to us without a charity suggestion, we are normally in a position to round up the amount we donate to charities, but we cannot guarantee this.
• We make regular distributions to beneficiary charities on an ongoing basis. We will normally include the charity suggestions from large donations in our next distribution following the sale of the shares, but we cannot guarantee this.
• All the donations we make to beneficiary charities come from ShareGift. We never pass on the names of our donors to beneficiary charities or to any other third party.
• We cannot enter into correspondence about the exact donations we will make or the timing of such donations in advance.  
• If you wish to let a charity know that you have donated shares to ShareGift and suggested them for a future gift from us, you are of course welcome to do so.
• If you would like to see a copy of a charity’s letter of acknowledgment / receipt of funds from ShareGift following your suggestion, please let us know.
• We are delighted to help, but can only operate as described. Please be sure that giving to ShareGift and the way we handle donations is appropriate for your purposes. Alternatively, you can contact the charity or charities that you are interested in for details of their own share donation procedures.

For information on tax, you can visit the HMRC website or more information is available on our site here

ShareGift’s costs:

ShareGift makes no charges to donors or charities. ShareGift meets its running costs partly from existing assets, general donations and from an endowment. ShareGift is run by a small team, and we keep our costs to a minimum so that we can pass on as much of our income as possible to charitable causes. We benefit from generous assistance with donated services, including free broking and custodial services. However, donations to help us continue to provide our assistance for free are always gratefully received.

Contact us:

If you have any further questions about any aspect of donating your shares, please contact us