It hardly matters that NetworkForGood doesn’t keep the entire 4.75%. What matters is that 4.75% of your donation dollars don’t go to the nonprofit you want to support.

Instead, you can give directly to the nonprofit or through another donation portal, such as JustGive or ChangingThePresent. Whether you give directly or through one of those other portals, the transaction costs are much lower, and more of your money will get to the nonprofits to do good.

It was great to speak to you at the Net Tuesday meetup.

From what I understood, Network For Good (NFG) asks the users if they want to remain anonymous. And if they opt to show their name, NFG shares their information with the organization they donated to. But this is only at the organizational level.

For privacy reasons, NFG elected to keep the names hidden from the “social networkers” who created the badges. So, at the individual level, this information is not shared. Katya mentioned that they are moving away from this approach. The next version of the widget will make it easier for the badge creators to see who donated to their cause.

Thanks for pointing out the transaction costs. One thing to note is that not all of the 4.75% goes directly to Network For Good. A portion is earmarked for costs that online transaction processors (credit card companies, merchant banks, etc) charge, which is generally the case with all online transactions.

The GiveWell blog has an ongoing discussion on Network For Good charges and what they are for. It is very informative with Holden’s questions and Katya’s answers. Check it out.