Sticky issues of reimbursing, paying and charging volunteers to volunteer

There are a lot of issues, legal, ethical and logistical, that come up when volunteers and money collide. It’s inevitable.

Most people have baggage around money issues, and when you combine volunteers and money, that baggage grows exponentially. We need to be willing to face the subject and have good, in-depth conversations about it.

There are three main areas about volunteers and money I see as needing discussion—reimbursing volunteers, providing volunteers with honorariums and charging people to volunteer.

Reimbursing volunteers

I’m surprised this still needs discussion.Just do it. With the skyrocketing cost of living, few people are willing to be out of pocket to give strangers a helping hand—even those who aren’t holding down three jobs and caring for infants and elders.

Pay for any police or background checks that are needed. Cover the cost of any training required. Provide mileage reimbursement when they use their own vehicles and, at the very least, add up all these expenses over the course of the year and issue them a tax receipt for the total.

Let them know you’re doing it. Make it perfectly clear at the outset it won’t cost them to volunteer with you. It's the least you can do until governments provide tax receipts for donated hours.

If you don’t reimburse volunteers, remember, all else being equal, those organizations that do will have more volunteers than you and will be able to achieve more. Isn’t your impact in the world why you exist? It’s worth the money. It really is.

Paying volunteers

This is a more complicated subject.

Depending on where you are in the world, there may be significant legal implications to providing volunteers with honorariums or stipends. In many jurisdictions, making someone a regular payment, even if it’s called an “honorarium,” can be construed as paying them a wage and thus turn them from a volunteer into an employee, with all the rights and benefits a regular employee is entitled to. The specific rules around what is or isn’t acceptable changes every time you cross a border, so I won’t go into details, but here are a few general tips:

• Make it clear from the beginning that the organization is under no obligation to make the payment

• The amount provided must be significantly less than market value for the services received

• The payments should not be made on a regular or on-going basis

There are exceptions to those guidelines, of course. If providing honorariums or stipends are, or are planned to be, part of your strategy, I strongly suggest you discuss it with a legal professional before you go any further.

Charging volunteers

This one runs the gamut of having a volunteer pay a nominal deposit on a uniform to charging people hundreds of dollars for the benefit of helping out at a large event.

Last October, it hit the news that the Ryder Cup 2025 golf tournament will charge volunteers almost $400 U.S. each to volunteer at the event. The organizers gave no explanation for the record-high charge.

I understand, somewhat, the rational behind charging a small fee to cover the costs of providing non-returnable gear or perks to a volunteer, especially if the organization has more volunteer applicants than they need. By charging a small fee for these items, not only can the organization recoup some of its expenses, but it also ensures volunteers have some “skin in the game,” making them more likely to show up for shifts.

I had a discussion once with a board member of a local ski patrol here in B.C. She was telling me they used to provide training and ski passes for free to all volunteers at the beginning of the season. According to her, a huge portion of those volunteers never showed up for a single shift. They just took the perks and disappeared. That’s when they started charging a membership fee. I get that. I don’t get the (level of the) Ryder Cup (fee). That’s just gouging.

If you are going to charge volunteers, I recommend you have policies and procedures in place to allow those to whom that charge is an insurmountable barrier to volunteering. Reduce or eliminate the fee, for example, after you’ve had a discussion with them and confirmed they would be a good fit and are reliable or set up some sort of payment plan. Without some option, you run the risk of limiting your volunteer diversity.

There are undoubtedly more issues around volunteers and money than I’ve mentioned here.

These, though, are the ones I think are most vital. What I’ve written are my opinions, but I’m open to learning. If you’d like to discuss your ideas and concerns about the subject, get in touch.

For us to make objective decisions about volunteers and money, we need to get together and sort through all the baggage, for the benefit of us all.

This article is written by or on behalf of an outsourced columnist and does not necessarily reflect the views of Castanet.