At a glance
Recent government reforms have put philanthropy in the spotlight. Judith Fiander, CEO of Australian Philanthropic Services (APS), discusses the power of structured giving and how it can help businesses achieve their charitable objectives while also engaging future generations.
A win for all
“Structured giving is one of those rare things in life that is genuinely a win-win-win for absolutely everybody involved. First off, there are the donors.
They benefit immediately with a tax deduction for the donation that they make into the structure and that deduction can be spread over up to five years.
They also often use the Private Ancillary Fund (PAF) as a training ground for the next generation in a couple of different ways: as an ethics and values tool in terms of getting young people engaged with giving and the social issues that they are interested in, and as a practical training ground for teaching the next generation about dealing with the wealth that they are going to inherit someday.”
Goal identification
“Australian Philanthropic Services (APS) is charity-agnostic and cause-agnostic as well. So when clients look to us in terms of support around their giving, we meet our clients where they are. A lot of our clients know exactly where they want to give and what charities they would like to make gifts to.”
“Other clients want more from us in the giving space. They might need some support grappling with a particular issue, working with multiple generations or coming together and formulating a giving strategy.
They might need some assistance in working out the particular areas that they would like to focus on.”
“We talk to our clients about where they want to give and we can give them information about particular charities, sector areas or educational tools – whatever it is that they need.”
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Yearly reflection
“What we find is that people will establish a structure or a giving fund, they’ve made their initial donation and then they need to, year on year, think about whether they might want to add to that in terms of what their tax planning looks like.
But they also are required to give away a minimum amount, and that means that they have to think regularly about what it is that they would like to support in terms of causal areas and individual charities.”
“We encourage clients to think about the impact that their funding is going to provide, to engage with the charity, to understand and look at how they are working and what’s coming out the other end in terms of community impact.”
