Car Donating - What They Don't Tell You

Go to Google.com (or any other big search engine) try searching for places to review and/or rate a charity. You won't find one. There's places that rate charities (usually another non-profit organization) but nowhere that an individual who has had real, personal experience with a charity in any way can write and post a review.

So, I invite you to respond to this post and rate charities you have dealt with.

I will start with a review of 2 car donation programs I tried to donate my car to and a review of the 1 I finally ended up donating to. Keep in mind that the car was in decent shape and still ran perfectly.

Breast Cancer Fund: From the information on their website, they use a for-profit 3rd party company for the handling of car donations. The online form is easy to use and the company is quick to respond. However... after that initial confirmation it was like pulling teeth to actually get the car taken. Every time I spoke to them, and the towing company afterwards, I insisted they use my cel number to contact me. Instead, they kept calling my work number, despite the fact that my work number wasn't even the primary number I specified on the online form and despite the fact that I told them I wasn't going to be at work for the next 5 days, because I was going to be at home, where the car was. They initially scheduled the pick-up for sometime, who knows when, on a Thursday and never showed. Then they scheduled the pick-up for sometime, who knows when, on a Tuesday and never showed. So, after having been in contact with these people almost every day for over a week, I finally told them to cancel the donation, I'd donate the car somewhere else.

American Heart Association: Another online form to fill out, however, you have to print out the form and mail it, along with all title paperwork, to Maine. This information is only specified in a small sentance on one screen in the middle of the information gathering process and not stated any other time. I'm sorry, having had too many things stolen from my mail, I'm not mailing title to my car across the country. And, when I called up the donation help line, I got the most arrogant, condecending attitude from the lady that handled my call.

Opportunity Village: I filled out the online form, got a call the next day from a very friendly lady who answered all of my questions and scheduled the car pick-up at my convenience. The tow-truck operator was given my cel phone and called to let me know he'd be late, but still showed up within a reasonable amount of time after the appointment time. He was very friendly, explained all the paperwork, and took the car with a minumum of fuss. However, the tax receipt for deduction value was a third of the fair market value.

Beyond these specific reviews, I would like to point out that not a single one of the organizations, usually despite ads stating you would get deduction receipts for fair market value, would actually give you fair market value. What happens is they auction off the vehicles and whatever they get, after costs apparently, is what they send you a deduction receipt for.

Again, I invite people to respond with their charity experiences.