Often, requests for charitable donations made in this newspaper quote a bank account. Unfortunately this is not the IBAN number, which it seems most banks promote.

The result is that extra bank charges become operative. These charges go up even more when the donor uses one bank and the request is made to transfer donations to another bank.

I recently made an online donation of €200 which involved a bank transfer to a non-IBAN numbered account. A condition was imposed by my bank that the bank charges had to be shared. I ended up paying €21 in bank charges. So, for a donation of €200, bank charges amounted to €42.

I appeal to those who request donations to quote the IBAN account number and also to give the prospective donor a variety of banks to choose from, at least the two leading banks.

On the same note, surely the banks making these charges could advise those who make the request to quote an IBAN number. After all, many banks make charitable donations directly. What is the point of robbing Peter to pay Paul?

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