Our Response
The Fundraising Regulator welcomes the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) preparation of guidance to support the charity sector using ‘charitable purpose soft opt-in’ once in force, where they choose to. We are also pleased to have had the opportunity to engage with the ICO about our insights into charitable fundraising, as you prepared for this consultation.
We find the guidance clearly describes the legal requirements and how they would typically affect charities. We are also pleased to see the Fundraising Preference Service (FPS) mentioned as an avenue for members of the public to exercise their ‘right to object’ to receiving charity fundraising marketing. We also welcome the accompanying message indicating that charities failing to act on a suppression request made via the FPS would be in breach of data privacy legislation.
Overall, we believe the introduction of soft opt-in for charities in the Privacy and Electronic Communications Regulation 2003 (PECR) represents a welcome opportunity for individual charities to strengthen engagement with their supporters. This might lead to some supporters generously making larger or more frequent financial donations to their preferred charities. At a time when many charities are facing acute financial pressures that affect front-line delivery this would be extremely beneficial to their cause. This is good news for those benefiting from the work of individual charities and the functioning of the whole charity sector for the public good.
Nevertheless, charity trustees, their staff and fundraisers will need to exercise caution and maintain vigilance when using soft opt-in. This is to avoid inadvertently engaging in behaviour that risks causing harm and damaging the valued public trust and confidence that charities rely on.
The Code of Fundraising Practice, which we set and maintain, already contains several rules relating to data privacy and information rights that reinforce the current legislation and will also have a bearing on soft opt-in once in force. These include that charitable fundraising organisations “must be able to justify how often [they] contact people about fundraising, balancing the need to communicate with not bombarding people” (code rule 8.4.4).
Once charitable purposes soft opt-in commences, we are highly likely to consider and, where appropriate, investigate any complaints we receive relating to the use of charitable purposes soft opt-in for fundraising purposes, including in circumstances where the ICO takes no action.
The charity sector is large, diverse in scale and resourcing – including made up of volunteers, employed staff, and contracted parties - and individual charities engage directly and indirectly with their supporters in a variety of ways for fundraising purposes. The more guidance and advice available to the sector, that closely reflects the real-world context in which they collect and process data for their fundraising marketing, the more the sector will be supported to comply with soft opt-in. This includes where they delegate aspects of their fundraising activity to third-party contractors, carry out novel fundraising practices, and use a range of techniques and technologies to manage their supporter data. We expect that individual charities and membership bodies will also respond to this consultation to convey how best your guidance can support their compliance. We expect that will provide valuable insights as you finalise your guidance.
In addition to guidance the ICO publishes, the Fundraising Regulator also intends to publish a resource for charities using soft opt-in for fundraising marketing purposes during early 2026. This would be for the purpose of supporting charity compliance with the law and with the Code of Fundraising Practice, in respect of fundraising marketing by charities. We may also use it to guide our response to any complaints we receive relating to soft opt-in. We would welcome the opportunity to further liaise with the ICO on this to ensure what we publish aligns with and effectively reinforces the ICO’s guidance.