And in greater Las Vegas, the self-described mother of three acknowledged online on Aug. 9 that she was not their biological mother. She said her partner is their father. As a result, some donors sought refunds under a GoFundMe guarantee. Overall contributions to the woman fell from $234,000 on the day she posted her update to $184,000 by Aug. 13.
When the Nevada woman's authenticity was called into question, a GoFundMe spokesperson said that the company followed standard practices and placed funds on hold until it obtained more information. GoFundMe then required the woman to post an online update and contacted donors to offer refunds, and it said it will return donations to those asking for their money back within a 14-day period. Afterward, “all funds will be used to cover living expenses and bills, and a dedicated amount will be put into an account for each child,” according to the spokesperson, who talked about GoFundMe but asked not to be identified by name.
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GoFundMe said it has “zero tolerance” for fraud. “It's important to restate our commitment to our community's safety, which we invest heavily in to ensure we are the most trusted online fundraising platform,” the spokesperson said, declining to quantify refunds in general. “Usage of the [donor] guarantee is very rare."
Fraud impacts fewer than one out of every 1,000 GoFundMe appeals, according to the spokesperson, who said about one-quarter of its 350-plus employees worldwide work on itsTrust & Safety team.
The modern-day ‘Queen for a Day'
5 tips to assess a GoFundMe campaign
1. Review the fundraiser page.Does the fundraiser have a clear title, image and story?
2. Understand the use of funds.What is the purpose of the fundraiser, and is the organizer transparent about how funds will be used?
3. Check the organizer or beneficiary connection.How is the organizer or beneficiary connected to the fundraiser?
4. Look at the comments and donations.Are family, friends or community members making donations and leaving supportive comments?
5. Ask questions.If something that doesn't seem right, donors may use two features that appear on every GoFundMe page: a contact button for the organizer of the fundraiser to pose questions and a “Report” button to alert the Trust & Safety team.
Source: GoFundMe
Boomers may recall Queen for a Day, a “sympathy show” that aired on TV from 1956 to 1964. Contestants described caring for a sick child or needing a hearing aid or a refrigerator, for example. Winners saw their dreams come true, descended a throne, and were crowned and given long-stemmed red roses.
That was then. Today, online charitable crowdfunding has showered money toward an array of needs, including more than $625 million raised on GoFundMe between March and August 2020 for pandemic-related hardships. More than 9 million donors supported those efforts. The site forwards donations to beneficiaries for needs including — but not limited to — health problems, disaster recovery, tuition, funerals and legal bills. In the last case, however, funds can't be used for crimes involving violence, terrorism, hate and other ills, according to theterms of service.
A survey released in April showed 91 percent of Americans were familiar with crowdfunding campaigns and 31 percent typically contribute to them. Donors to such fundraisers gave an average of $189 in 2019, most often to support a relative or close friend (52 percent) and charitable organizations (47 percent).The surveywas conducted by Indiana University's Lilly Family School of Philanthropy.
Only the rare GoFundMe campaign goes viral, other research has shown. While such successes trigger publicity, so does greed. In June, a Florida woman was sentenced to prison for setting up a GoFundMe campaign ostensibly for relatives of the victims of a triple murder in 2020, The Ledger newspaper, of Lakeland, Florida,reported. Afterward, she went on shopping sprees, paid a utility bill and sent herself funds via PayPal. GoFundMe said it took down that campaign last year and gave refunds to all donors. The sentencing judge ordered the woman to repay GoFundMe $11,500.
