I have decided to set up a joint online donations page for for two charities Kidz2gether and Daytrippers Bolton for various reasons. I have sent the email below to both charities which explains my reasons for doing so and how I am going about setting this up.

Hello

I am conducting a number of challenges this year and hoping to raise a heap of cash for a number of charities that I have either had the pleasure of being involved in or those who have been fantastic and supportive to my family and friends.

The first two of the five challenges I am attempting this year are as follows:

• Swimming 1,000 x 25m lengths of the Horwich Leisure Centre pool (est. 12 hours to complete on Wednesday 7th May)
• The Great North Swim 2014 at Windermere (14th June)

I would like to complete both of these challenges with all proceeds raised split between Kidz2gether and Daytrippers Bolton. I am hoping the 1,000 length swim on it’s own should raise a good amount of money.

There are many reasons why I have chosen these two charities, including the past care for my nephew Luke Carruthers and the continued support you give to the players of AFC Masters, the disability football club I help coach with Iain Massingham.
Also, during the disability workshop weekend I attended a while ago and at recent charity events I also learned a lot about the fantastic support you provide.

Setting up a joint charity donations page initially gave me problems as you can’t set up JustGiving page with more than one charity. Even if it was possible I understand that Daytrippers Bolton is not a registered charity or something along the lines which means that they not entitled to Gift Aid?

What I suggest is that I set up a page with GoFundMe which will allow me to set up both charities on one page and allow me to withdraw the cash once each challenge has been completed. I will then split the cash and donate through the Kidz2gether JustGiving page and Daytrippers Bolton’s MyDonate from BT – that way Kidz2gether will also get the Gift Aid.

I’ll also be hopefully raising a lot of cash from a donations bucket I’ll have placed at Horwich Leisure Centre on the day I will be doing the 1,000 swim challenge and I am sure most of my friends will prefer to donate by hand. With this cash I will put this into my personal bank and again send this to you as proposed.

I have sent this email to both charities via info@kidz2gether.org.uk and daytrippers.bolton@hotmail.co.uk.

If you would like to arrange a telephone conversation with me please do so, my mobile telephone number is 07729 803417.

I look forward to training and preparing for these challenges. The most lengths I have attempted to swim in one go is 200 so this is a monster of a challenge. As for the Great North Swim, I am particularly afraid of swimming in deep, open, cold water so this will be a scary and unique challenge on its own.

I have set up a WordPress blog if you would like to keep up to date and track my progress which is found at: https://gofatginger.wordpress.com/

Many Thanks and Kindest Regards,

Paul Carruthers