Collateral damage: Russian charities for the seriously ill on the brink of collapse due to war and sanctions

Regular donations are the backbone of a charity's operations. They ensure stable support for its clients a month or a year into the future. At the moment, large foundations have registered a drastic decrease in subscription payments, brought about by the restrictions imposed on banks and bank cards and the withdrawal of Apple Pay, Google Pay, and PayPal from the Russian market.

In just a few weeks, the VERA Hospice Charity Fund has lost 947 monthly subscriptions amounting to 896,000 rubles, which means over 10 million rubles (~$121,000) a year. This money would buy six hospital beds or cover nutritional support for 12 children with severe conditions.

The Podari Zhizn Foundation fell 1,500 subscriptions short in March: 1.5 million rubles less a month, 18 million rubles (~$218,000) a year. According to CEO Ekaterina Shergova, the reasons were mostly technical: 80% of subscriptions ended up canceled because they had been set up through Apple Pay and Google Pay.

“Another 300 users canceled their subscriptions manually, which is twice the monthly average. In addition, the foundation had to disable all monthly subscriptions via PayPal to the total amount of around 400,000 rubles (~$4800) a month after the service withdrew from Russia.”

The Zhivi Seychas Foundation, which helps patients suffering from amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), has lost 50% of its monthly private donations – around 1 million rubles (~$12,000) a month, says CEO Natalia Lugovaya.

“We have observed a lot of interruptions with subscriptions linked to Russian bank cards. Systemic errors occur with one-time payments as well as automatic withdrawals of regular payments. Hopefully, it’ll get fixed before long. We stopped receiving any foreign assistance at all.”

Regional NGOs are faring somewhat better, with the majority of their donors being local. Thus, the Dedmorozim Foundation, which offers assistance to orphans and seriously ill children of the Perm Territory, is yet to lose any subscribers. According to Inna Babina, head of the foundation’s fund-raising and PR team, very few of their donors chose Apple Pay or Google Pay as the payment method.

“We hardly ever receive transfers from foreign bank cards, so we haven't lost any subscriptions. However, our donors have been facing more issues with transactions: with a monthly average of 35-40 transaction errors, our regular donors encountered almost 150 in March.”