Letter: Pestering by charities

Sir: Andrew Gentles (Letters, 27 September) is certainly not alone. My recent contributions to charity have elicited many requests (both by letter and telephone) for further donations, as well as books of raffle tickets, leaflets for lobbying local retailers, requests to distribute Christmas catalogues and make door-to-door collections and, most irritatingly of all, a multiple-choice questionnaire, purportedly for donor research purposes, in which each question was along the lines of "Will you send us a further donation or would you rather allow children/animals/the homeless to be starved/tortured/exploited?"

I cannot help feeling that the cost of this futile pestering has probably used up a significant proportion of my initial modest contributions. Those charities that simply send me an information sheet explaining how my money will be spent are the most likely to benefit from my continued support.

ANDY TYE

Horsham, West Sussex