Click on the links below for more information about the different ways to give.
Contactless Giving |
Legacy Giving |
Online Giving |
Regular Giving (Parish Giving Scheme) |
To help encourage people to give we need to provide the right mechanisms. The more options we can offer and the easier it is for people to give, the more success there will be.
When considering how to improve your giving mechanisms look closely at what your church is currently doing and think about the following:
- How do you invite visitors to give financially to your church?
- Imagine you are new to your church, how easy is it to start giving regularly?
- Who do people need to speak to?
- Is it clear on your church website or AChurchNearYou page?
- Consider how you normally give to charity outside of church. Is it different and if so, are there ideas that you could think about introducing to your church?
- Does your church use technology like contactless devices or an online giving platform?
For more information or to discuss your parish's individual needs please contact the Diocesan Giving Adviser, Lindsay Yates.
Contactless Giving
Contactless giving enables people to give to your church quickly and easily by debit or credit card.
People carry far less cash than they used to and more and more payments are now made by contactless or card payment. It is important that our churches enable people to give by contactless giving too.
Contactless giving is not a substitute for regular planned giving (such as via the Parish Giving Scheme), but it offers visitors to your church an opportunity to give and offers your church the ability to accept fees for baptisms, weddings and other occasional offices by card.
Consider whether you want a basic contactless device (such as a Sum Up air or Sum Up solo) for collecting fees or whether you want something with more of a presence to help to encourage generous giving (such as a Payaz or CollecTin). You can find details of different contactless devices available at a discount and with preferential transaction rates on the Parish Buying Website
Online Giving
Online giving enables people to give to your church through your church website or social media page, making it easy for people to give. Recommended platforms for churches are Give A Little,Stripe and Sum-Up. Details of how to get started are available via Parish Buying.
Legacies
Generosity is at the core of Christian discipleship and this extends past the end of our lives. Gifts in wills are a valuable source of income for churches with most unrestricted gifts forming the backbone of church reserves.
Leaving a gift in your will to your church will helps to serve the needs of your church community long into the future. Our churches depend on the generosity of these gifts (whether large or small) to carry out much needed refurbishments, launch outreach projects and to grow their mission and ministry.
Faith Will
The Church of England is partnering with Christian Aid as part of its Faith Will Campaign which focusses on the good that we can achieve by leaving a gift to both Christian Aid and our local church in our will. Christian Aid has produced a range of resources to help churches talk about wills and legacies with their congregations and can also provide a speaker for any events churches put on promoting legacies.
The Church of England receives less through legacies than many other charities and it is important to remind people of the good that can be achieved by leaving a legacy to fund crucial humanitarian work carried out across the world by Christian Aid, as well as to local churches which have unique opportunities to transform their local communities in Christ's name. People on average leave around three gifts to charities in their wills and churches that have already run the campaign found it easier to ask people to remember their church when they were also asking for another charity.
For more about the Faith Will Campaign see the Christian Aid website and contact generousgiving@diocant.org.
You can also watch a recording of our Canterbury Diocese webinar led by the Faith Will team from Christian Aid below.
What should the PCC do about Legacies?
It is important that your PCC has a policy about legacy giving that you share with your congregation so that they will know what will happen to their gift. For help and advice creating your legacy policy contact our finance team. Please find a Legacy policy template here.
You should also consider how you can promote will-making and legacy giving in your parish and you may wish to consider running a legacy campaign. To begin to plan this you can order your free PCC toolkit.
Resources & Information
The Church Legacy website is full of essential information on encouraging people to make wills, and legacy giving.
Parish Giving Scheme
Created by the Church for the Church. A non-profit organisation facilitating regular giving in every church.
The Parish Giving Scheme is an excellent way to encourage greater generosity within your church. PGS offers significant benefits compared to other forms of giving:
- It's free and your church receives the full value of all donations every month
- Gift Aid is automatically processed every month, reducing admin for church volunteers and improving cash flow
- Givers can choose to automatically increase their giving by the rate of inflation every year. This tackles the problem of 'static giving', where people’s giving ordinarily remains the same year on year, while the costs of the church rise continually, due to inflation
- Givers can sign up by paper form, over the telephone or online, making it a great resource for both rural and urban parishes
- Adopting a new scheme offers a great opportunity to discuss regular giving with the church community
- Givers can make one-off payments by credit/debit cards and Apple/Google pay.
If you're an existing donor wanting to make changes to your direct debit, you can do this on your online account, over the phone via 0333 002 1260 or by email at info@parishgiving.org.uk.
The scheme is a registered charity and is used by most dioceses in the Church of England.
Registering your Church for PGS
It is free for your parish to register with PGS - if you would like to do so, please fill in the relevant form below. Below you'll also find a step-by-step guide for registering your church and a special guide for PCCs - please make sure that you've read both of these documents before filling out your registration form. Once you have completed your form please send it to parishgiving@diocant.org.
- PGS: A Guide for PCCs
- How to Register your Church for the Parish Giving Scheme: A step-by-step guide
- PGS Single Church Registration Form (please set your printer to use A4 paper and scale to fit)
- PGS Multi-Church Registration Form (please set your printer to use A4 paper and scale to fit)
- Giving To... Template Promotional Leaflet
- How to launch PGS for the first time
- Introduction to the Parish Giving Scheme
Once your parish is registered with the scheme, it is quick and easy for people to give. Further information for givers can be found in Your Guide to Giving.
If you are interested in setting up the scheme in your church and would like to find out more, please contact the Generous Giving Adviser, Lindsay Yates.