The introduction of Virgin Money Giving appears to have had a mild effect on JustGiving’s London Marathon fundraising figures, as the fundraising stalwart reports an early total of £19.3m, down by more than £3m from the same time last year and predicts total fundraising will be short of last year's final total by up to 12 per cent.

Virgin Money Giving said that it was not able to release figures on how much it raised via the London Marathon until they were signed off by the Marathon itself. The online fundraising newcomer did report that it has now raised more than £10m since entering the market in mid-October last year.

JustGiving was widely expected to see a fall in 2010 Marathon fundraising figures as Virgin Money Giving is the preferred fundraising partner of the race, which was sponsored by Virgin for the first time this year. Figures from April 27 last year put JustGiving's Marathon fundraising total at just under £22.5m, which was an improvement on 2008 numbers. 

Heather Bird, head of community at JustGiving, told Fundraising: "While we may not beat last year’s £25m total (including gift aid) we are thrilled by the fact that most fundraisers running the London Marathon continue to trust JustGiving, and that, donations on Marathon day itself were higher than last year. We expect another 20 per cent of donations to come in after the Marathon and we estimate that a staggering £22 – 23m will be raised through JustGiving."

However, JustGiving reported 20,000 Marathon-related fundraising pages and an average fundraising total of £1,308 – up 4.5 per cent on last year’s page averages. The site also reported that Friday 23 April, saw donations of £1.8m processed on the site – the second-highest in the company’s history.