News

PFRA seeks 'core group' for attrition benchmarking

Fundraising | Celina Ribeiro | 12 Jan 2010

The PFRA is aiming to establish a ‘core group’ of charities for its annual attrition survey after low participation levels in the first two years.

The Public Fundraising Regulatory Association is offering membership fee rebates for 15 charities to commit to pooling their donor retention data in the PFRA’s annual face-to-face attrition survey for the next five years.

The ‘core group’ of 15 will form part of a larger sample group, but last year’s survey total sample included just 20 charities. 2009’s participation rate was lower than that in 2008, after which point PFRA chief executive Mick Aldridge expressed the hope that more members would participate in the future.

Survey co-devisor and Quarriers head of fundraising Morag Fleming said that the results collected by the survey are sound. Forty-four charities have participated in the survey over the two years, but just ten have participated in both, she said adding that the quality of the results had not been affected “because each time the total numbers of donors of the participating charities was well over a quarter of a million, so both years’ findings were extremely robust”.

The creation of the ‘core group’, however, is designed “to add another layer of robustness to the survey”, she said.

“With these charities on board we can be totally confident that every year DARS [Donor Attrition and Retention Survey] will reflect the biggest players in F2F fundraising and allow us to set an attrition benchmark that is unparalleled in the fundraising sector,” she added.

Five charities have already signed up to be part of the core group, including Quarriers, Shelter, Concern Universal, EveryChild and Epilepsy Action.

Survey goes global

The PFRA’s survey remains the only one of its kind in the world and this year the organisation intends to expand participation globally. Fleming and Rupert Tappin, co-devisor of the survey, have been in talks with Madrid-based Daryl Upsall of Daryl Upsall Consulting about the prospect of including European charities’ attrition data in the PFRA survey.

The PFRA will be asking members to participate in the survey in March, with results due to be announced at the organisation’s AGM in June.

To participate in the core group, charities are advised to contact Morag Fleming directly (morag.fleming@quarriers.org.uk), or to participate in the survey this year contact Ian MacQuillin, PFRA head of communications (ian@pfra.org.uk).

Directory: Public Fundraising Regulatory Association (PFRA)
Who's Who: Rupert Tappin | Morag Fleming | Mick Aldridge