Transnational Giving Europe

Transnational Giving Europe (TGE) is a project to allow tax-efficient donations to charities across EU borders.

The project is particularly streamlined in Germany, the country where the project began. In Germany, donors can donate to non-German charities tax-efficiently via the Maecenata Stiftung either by bank transfer or by card payment, using their online form or direct bank transfer. The form can also be used to set up monthly, quarterly, six-monthly and annual recurring payments.

Whisper is not yet registered with TGE. To accept donations via TGE, Whisper would need to register via CAF which is the TGE partner organisation in the UK. At the same time, Whisper should probably open an EUR-denominated bank account with its bank Barclays, to avoid unnecessary currency conversions and the high bank charges involved with sending money from the Eurozone to the UK (Maecenata Stiftung charges €35 per transfer to GBP).

CAF (which runs the scheme in the UK) says that we’d need to apply for each individual country only when donations are likely from that country (form geaf_tge_2017.docx) and then wait for confirmation from the relevant partner organisation. Also:

• Czech Republic is not on their list
• Sweden is not on their list (there are no tax incentives for giving to charity in Sweden)
• Ireland, from which we recently received a large donation, is temporarily not on their list

So for now we have not applied.

TGE charges a fee of 5% of the donation.

Online Giving Portal

TGE has an online giving portal here for one-off or recurring tax-efficient donations from EU countries. There is a £500 setup fee, and transaction fees depending on the countries involved.