SMS fundraising has been opened up to a wider range of charities today as the Charities Aid Foundation launches a text donation service.

Following the dropping of charges on mobile donations levied by mobile companies over this year, charities have been increasingly eyeing mobile phones as a potential fundraising device, only to often be priced out by technology set-up costs.

The CAF service will allow charities to use one of two short codes, for either a £3 or £5 donation, and will be managed entirely by CAF, from setting up keywords to collecting gift aid. Charities will be charged £20 a month per keyword and CAF will levy a 2.5 per cent charge on the value of each donation.

CAF imagines that the service, which is run in association with Vir2 Ltd, will enable charities to use mobile phones to raise money both for emergency appeals as well as in their day-to-day fundraising.

John Low, CAF chief executive, said: “Donating by text is easy, quick and simple for both donors and charities.  We have seen substantial growth in donating by text with Comic Relief raising £7.8m this way in 2009.
 
“Since VAT free charity short-codes were introduced and mobile phone networks significantly improved their payout rates, it has become much cheaper and more effective for all charities to benefit from text donations.”