Join one of our collections or hold your own to stand with people facing homelessness.
Stand with people facing homelessness and donate a few hours of your time to collect for Crisis this Christmas. There's a number of Crisis collections that you can volunteer at – we’d love you to join us! Find out more information and sign up below.
If you’re a choir and would like to sing at one of our collections, we’d also love to have you on board! Please get in touch at collections@crisis.org.uk.
If you’d like to hold your own collection, we’d love to hear from you! You might have an upcoming carol concert, Christmas fayre or perhaps want to organise something in your local area.
Whatever you’re planning, we can help with supplying buckets, tins and t-shirts and give guidance on applying for permits. Please get in touch at collections@crisis.org.uk to get started.
We've made a step-by-step guide for all the things you need to consider to plan and hold your own collection.
Take a look at our FAQs below - if you have any questions get in touch at collections@crisis.org.uk.
If you signed up online, and provided an email address, we will send you an email confirming your sign up within three working days of signup. If you did not provide an email address or you have still not received a confirmation email please get in touch at collections@crisis.org.uk to speak with one of the collections team about your requested shift.
You will be given the name of a point of contact in your final email from the team which will be sent one week before your shift. This email will confirm all details that you need for your shift.
The number of collectors allowed varies from station to station, but is never less than 2 and is usually 4 or more. You may also be collecting alongside a volunteer Christmas Carol choir. On rare occasions, we might have people pulling out of the collections on the day but we will always do our best to fill these spaces should this happen.
Why not ask a friend or family member to sign up so you can collect together?
If you are unable to make your shift please try and give us enough notice to be able to find someone else to collect in your place. It is really important for us to have a full shift of people collecting so we can raise as much funds as possible for homeless people.
In the instance that you are unable to attend please contact your collection host or fundraiser (their phone number will be on the confirmation email you receive) to explain that you won’t be able to attend.
A Crisis t-shirt will be provided for you to wear, you can collect this on the day alongside your collection bucket from your designated pick up venue (details of this will be in the email you receive two weeks before your shift).
We would suggest wearing something warm and most importantly that you wear comfortable shoes!
We absolutely encourage some festive cheer at our collections so if you fancy popping on a Santa hat, elf ears or a full-blown Santa outfit then please do but this is not essential.
There won’t always be somewhere to put valuables, so we suggest you only bring the bare essentials with you.
Every collection venue will have a variety of shops close by that you can purchase food and drink.
We are only allowed a set amount of people to collect at each collection venue as per their rules and regulations.
If you would like friends or family to join you we suggest that you ask them to sign up to the same shift as you.
Please be aware that children are not allowed to collect any actual money (the legal age for collecting is 16), but they are welcome to come along and keep you company. Dogs are always fun to bring along, but please email collections@crisis.org.uk to see if your collection point is appropriate for animals.
We will email you some information about out work and provide a copy of this when you collect your bucket and Crisis t-shirt. If anyone asks a question you are unable to answer please provide them with our website address: www.crisis.org.uk where they can find out more information about our work or if there question is more specific then please ask them to email their enquiry to following email address: fundraise@crisis.org.uk
It’s best practice not to shake the tin or bucket.
You can certainly talk about the collection, but it’s best not to shout. You’ll get a feel for how individual people like to be approached.
There may be a choir present at some of the shifts and venues, you will be informed in your email if this is the case. If so, you will find that most people will come over to listen which is a great opportunity to move around the crowds with your collection bucket (feel free to sing along with the choir as you go!)
Depending on your collection venue, you will either be asked to leave your money at a designated point such as a nearby hotel or you will have a designated money collection volunteer who will come and collect money from you after your shift. Further details of this will be emailed to you two weeks before your shift.
The money collected for each venue will be counted and announced a maximum of a week after your collection. We will inform you what your venue raised as a whole for that day and an average per volunteer. This figure will be communicated to you and your fellow volunteers for that day.
If you have any further questions that are not listed, please email collections@crisis.org.uk
