ChipIn: The easy way to collect money!

This looks like probably one of the simplest fundraising sites around and can be used to collect money for all sorts of purposes, charitable or personal. By setting up your cause you can then broadcast it and get your friends and family “chip in” and help it towards its goal.

It’s free to set up a ChipIn account and you only need to enter a few details like how much you need, why you need it and when you need it by. Oh and you’ll need to enter your PayPal details too as all contributions are made directly to you and not held by the site in any way.

If you’re collecting for a cause or charity that already has a website you can embed the ChipIn widget directly on to it which will alert visitors to the fundraising event and keep them up to date with progress. If you’re collecting independently then you can create your own ChipIn web page, again free of charge, where you can provide more details about the cause. The page will automatically include the progress feature.

The widget also works with many social media sites like myspace and netvibes and visitors to your Facebook page can obviously be diverted to your ChipIn web page giving a very wide exposure to the event.

A fairly fundamental point to note is the lack of any individual support available on this one. Whilst the site is obviously still live (I had a positive response when I applied to open an account) there also appears to be an issue when trying to link through to the FAQ section. There is a number to call with a 72 hour return call promise. It might be a good idea to try this number before going too far along the line and getting set up.

Conclusion
This does look like a simple site to use as long as you’re comfortable with the lack of any customer support. With all donations going directly to your own PayPal account though security issues shouldn’t occur.