Relief money via texting surpasses $4 million
January 14 could be the biggest day for mobile giving to date, as word that texting “Haiti” to number 90999 to donate $10 to the American Red Cross went viral via Twitter, Facebook, and news reports. (Facebook reports that its users have been posting more than 1,500 status updates a minute containing the word Haiti.)
In $10 increments, more than $4 million has been raised via the MGive Foundation’s Haiti campaign, according to a Verizon Wireless spokesman. The campaign was set up with with the U.S. State Department and Red Cross late Tuesday night. While the total had reached $2 million Wednesday night, it climbed to $3 million overnight and surpassed $4 million Thursday morning–a number that could continue climbing steadily for days.
“Today is a huge day for mobile giving,” Tony Aiello, chief executive of MGive, told The New York Times. “We are experiencing a tipping point.”
MGive offers a variety of mobile giving campaigns, including texting “DOB” to the same number to donate to Doctors Without Borders and “need” to Neediest Kids, and has waived its typical licensing fee to the Red Cross so that 100 percent of every donation actually makes its way to the relief organization.
“Catastrophic fund-raising is different from the everyday fund-raising that we help facilitate,” Aiello says. “This is a huge tragedy, and we simply hope to help provide relief.”
According to MGive’s Haiti FAQ, most mobile carriers allow only two $10 donations to be made a month, and users will be billed for these donations by their carriers, not MGive. Meanwhile, MGive’s 90999 HAITI campaign only works for U.S. mobile phone numbers.
Receipts of donations can be both confirmed and printed at http://mgive.org/receipt/ by entering the mobile phone number used to make one’s text donation. The MGive Foundation, established just four months ago, says it is responsible for raising more than 90 percent of all funds to date through the mobile giving channel.
Haitian-born singer Wyclef Jean, who runs the charity organization Yele, has also set up a mobile donation campaign, through which people can donate $5 when they text “Yele” to number 501501, or more when they donate online.