Givinga Foundation, Inc

Reta Keenan

We received a check for $0.43 and I don't know if this is a legitimate foundation or a scam. Does anyone have knowledge of this company or had experience with receiving a donation from them?

Faith Murray

I always recommend accessing Candid's nonprofit look-up database when encountering an odd nonprofit or foundation name. Givinga's profile is listed here, and they are a DAF host entity that believes in opening up DAF's to small donors without minimum deposit amounts. Hence, the miniscule size of your donation. Some donor probably deposited $10 in their new DAF account, and you received the interest dividend as a grant.

We have been the recipient of an anonymous $1.91 grant from Givinga ourselves, about a year ago. The check cleared and we never encountered any issues.

Sharyn Lilly

Is there a way to find out who the donor is when you receive one of these checks?

Faith Murray

Unfortunately, most of the time not. There's no online portal like Benevity or JustGiving that exports the donor data. They operate more like a regular DAF manager (think Fidelity or EdwardJones), and often don't give out the donor name. I always figure it's worth calling their office anyway and asking, though!

Elizabeth Ackerson

Givinga Foundation is a start-up tech company in Boston, MA that builds software for charitable giving. I work at the Cambridge Community Foundation in Cambridge, MA, and we've had conversations with them. They are expanding- most of their work is with companies and employee giving.

Mary Schultz

If you have an invoice number included with the check, you can enter it on Givinga's Charity Portal to get any provided donor information. I'd say about half of our payments so far have been completely anonymous.