A new portal aims to help voluntary organisations sustain their efforts and charitable work by raising funds over the internet. The website, www.simplygiving.org.mt, provides the necessary secure technical infrastructure to support online donations.

"The current problem with individuals fundraising for their favourite charity in Malta is that they collect money (often cash in hand) that puts the fundraiser and the charity at risk, or in questionable accountability," Nathan Farrugia, managing director of Charity Works and the brains behind the idea, explained.

"Also, the cost of fundraising in Malta is very high. Putting up a fundraising event usually costs around 50 per cent of the turnover. We have designed a concept that will allow both charities and individuals to fundraise using a single donation portal. This ensures that the costs are drastically reduced, as they are divided by the many charities and individuals. Ultimately, it makes fundraising much more accountable and easy to do, both for the fundraiser and the donor. For charities, it is a highly cost-effective and reliable way of raising funds."

While Mr Farrugia came up with the concept and design brief, web development company Alert Communications developed the site and created the tool that handles the donations.

This tool creates fundraising websites and online marketing functionality - every charity that signs up would vastly multiply its fundraising "team" because everyone out there who respects their work has the potential to become a bona fide fundraiser for them, not just a donor.

So instead of 100 people giving €10, those hundred could be raising €100 or €1,000 each.

All the funds go through strict secure gateways and are then transferred to the charity, in a fully transparent and audited manner. The cost of this type of fundraising is reduced to 10 per cent, which includes all bank costs, the payment gateway costs, the website design and maintenance, marketing and administration. In contrast to other technological fund-raising tools, charities are being promised they will receive the funds within a month of the campaign ending. The campaign ends 60 days after the event ends, purely to give time to let the fundraiser collect any pledges people have given if the event is a success.

All major debit and credit cards will be accepted. As in any credit card transaction, there can be reclaims as part of the rules of card payments.

Although the website has been accessible for only a few days, it has already sparked a lot of interest. One of the first users is Inspire, the Foundation for Inclusion that resulted from the amalgamation of the Eden Foundation and Razzett Foundation, Flimkien għal Ambjent Aħjar, YMCA and Happy Paws.

"We have a number of fundraising initiatives that were just awaiting the finalisation of the site, including a world record athletic challenge as well as the Ironman bid I am attempting, so we expect to launch with a good number of fundraising activities going on," Mr Farrugia said.