Today's installment of "Keeping the Trains Running?" -

I recently received the following email from a member, in fact from someone I had recently been on an overseas trip with. I was not pleased to have had to address the issue. More comments follow, at the end.

Hello

I believe someone has made a mistake

This is NOT how you acknowledge a donation. You are a IRS 501(c)3 corporation.

Or ARE you? see below

There are definite IRS rules and commonly used statements that go with a donation acknowledgement.

This reads like I received goods and services for the money I donated

It even SAYS payment applied to the items you ordered.

Even the subject line reads improperly. I did NOT make a ":payment" for goods and services. I made a cash donation in accord with the IRS rules for donations

Or ARE you a tax exempt entity able to accept qualified donations? I just spent 10 minutes looking at the web site, especially

https://home.arrl.org/action/Donate

and NOWHERE does it state ANY IRS status or classification

The TOP of the page for donations should precisely state the ARRL's IRS status with respect to donations

The ABOUT section should also clearly state the IRS status for donations

the contact ARRL section does NOT clearly show a contact for donations, you have to guess that it might be under contributions, grants and scholarships

Please review this and the procedures that caused it and then send me a properly worded donation acknowledgement

I will not be making any further donations until this is clearly resolved and the IRS status is posted properly on the web site

----- Original Message -----

From: noreply@arrl.org

To:

Sent:

Subject: Thank you for your payment

Dear :

Thank you for your recent payment of $400.00. Your payment has been applied to the following items you recently ordered.

Order Details:

Order # Item Amount

3000497640 Education & Technology Fund $200.00

3000497640 Spectrum Defense Fund $200.00

We’re here to help! Contact us below with any questions you have about your order.

ARRL The National Association for Amateur Radio®
225 Main Street, Newington, CT 06111-1400 USA
Tel: 860-594-0200 or Toll-Free 1-888-277-5289
Membership@arrl.org
PubSales@arrl.org
Development@arrl.org

It appears that the League is using software designed for product sales to input monetary data from donations. The language used in the email isn't appropriate for the circumstances. If this is an issue with the Personify program, this should have been noticed and fixed before implementation.

1) There was no reason to even send this email. The League followed up with an appropriate donation acknowledgement postal letter that can be used for tax purposes. Nothing more than the postal acknowledgement was required.

2) If there was some need to send an email, different text emails are appropriate for donations, rather than use product sales language..

3) If for some reason, handling sales and donations cannot be separated, and there is also some need to send a separate acknowledgement email, more appropriate language could be used in the text that appropriately serviced both types of transactions.

I spend considerable effort promoting the ARRL. I'm embarrassed to have to defend process like this to long-duration League supporters..

The member expected more.

I expected more.

Are the trains running in an acceptable fashion?

73,

Dick, N6AA

*Order #*	*Item*	*Amount*
3000497640	Education & Technology Fund	$200.00
3000497640	Spectrum Defense Fund	$200.00