Gift Aid Your Donation
Are you a UK tax payer? If so, use Gift Aid to make your donation even more valuable to Earthwatch. "Gift Aiding" your donation is simple, and it costs you nothing. In fact, if you are a UK tax payer at the higher rate, you can claim the difference between the higher rate of tax and the basic rate of tax on donations made with Gift Aid on your Self Assessment return!
If you gift aid your donation, Earthwatch will claim from Her Majesty's Revenue & Customs (HMRC) 25p for every £1 you donate. So, for example, your £100 donation will allow Earthwatch to claim £25 from HMRC, making your gift worth £125. If you give £5.00 per month, we'll claim £1.25 per month from HMRC, making your gift worth £6.25 per month.
Gift Aid is a government scheme that allows charities to claim basic rate tax that you have paid on the amount of your donation. This is tax that would otherwise be spent on government programmes. Gift Aid was set up as an incentive for people to donate to charities because it makes their donations worth more to their favourite charities.
To qualify for Gift Aid, you must be a UK tax payer (for the current year beginning 6th April) and the amount of income and/or capital gains tax you pay in the tax year must at least equal the amount of tax that Earthwatch will claim. This is because HMRC cannot give money you've paid in tax to Earthwatch if you haven't paid it in the first place! It does not matter whether you pay income tax at the starting, basic, or higher rate.