Not every charity has to be registered – but if they are, they’ve usually signed up to strict standards of practice, conduct and transparency. They are regularly reviewed against these standards.

The Australian Charities and Not-for-Profits Commission (ACNC) is the regulatory body for charities in Australia and provides helpful information about charities. You can search for information on a charity on the ACNC Charity Register.

The Australian Council for International Development (ACFID) is a voluntary body for Australian charities that work in international aid and development. ACFID requires its members to comply with its Code of Conduct. 

Tax deductibility can be an important incentive to donate.

Only some registered charities are endorsed by the Australian Tax Office to offer tax deductible donations in Australia, and many registered charities do not have this ‘deductible gift recipient’ endorsement. The ACNC Charity Register can confirm this.

 If you are donating to help with an emergency overseas, your donation may not be tax deductible. If your donation is being used in a country declared as ‘developing’ then it should be tax deductible under the Overseas Aid Gift Deduction Scheme. But if you’re donating to a disaster in, for example, the United States or United Kingdom, then it may not be.

You can always ask a charity to confirm whether your donation is tax deductible. 

The charity should explain how it plans to use your donation. 

Quite often, charities use donations to provide financial assistance directly to people affected by a disaster. But that’s not the only thing needed. Your donation may also provide relief supplies, equipment and transport for volunteers, or ensure that trained, expert staff members can coordinate massive relief efforts. 

Sometimes charities like Red Cross will launch appeals for specific disasters. But it’s also important to note that emergency agencies often need donations year-round to ensure their teams are trained and resourced and ready to respond to any emergency.

Administrative costs refer to all the things that make emergency response work possible and accountable. They can range from petrol and electricity, to back-end data management systems and fundraising costs. They can increase depending on the scale of the emergency operation.

Most charities try hard to keep these costs low – around 10 cents in the dollar is standard. And sometimes a generous corporate donor will step in and cover them. But no charity can do its work without them, no matter how lean its budget gets.