Calgary fundraiser $10K short after processing glitches

For the Ujamaa Grandmas, the numbers simply did not add up.

The Calgary organizationraises thousands of dollars every year for African charities, selling handmade crafts.

And their annual Bags, Babies and Beyond Sale appeared to be a smashing success, raising close to $48,000 over the span of 12 hours on Oct. 19 and 20.

That money was earmarked for the Stephen Lewis Foundation, which then distributes it to various community-based organizations throughout Africa, who help grandmothers there many of whom, in the aftermath of the AIDS epidemic a decade ago were left to raise orphaned children.

'Devastating'

It turned out that not all the debit and credit card payments were properly processed, said board chair Jan Geggie, in a Friday interview on the Calgary Eyeopener.

"Close to $10,000, which was devastating," Geggie said. "Becausepeople who have created all of these hand-crafts they spend thousands of hours creating them and they're beautiful items it's $10,000 less that we have to send the Stephen Lewis Foundationto help fund [African] grandmothers."

The group might not have even discovered what happened except they started to hear from various customers, who reported to the organisation that the transaction hadn't gone through.

"Then we started to look and our treasurer and our two past treasurers spent hundreds and hundreds of hours trying to reconcile all of the payments, so we do have a list ofof all the people we would like to be touch with," Geggie said.

The group has already been in touch with a number of clients, and have recouped approximately $3,000 of the $10,000, leaving them $7,000 short, Geggie said.

She hopes to be able to recoup the rest of the money, because the Stephen Lewis Foundation is able to impact a substantial number of lives.

"The Stephen Lewis Foundationhas a wonderful organization in Africa. They work with community based organizations who help grandmothers, in their daily lives, in terms of helping their grandchildren andother children they're looking after who've been orphaned," added Geggie.

"From Toronto, the moneyis sent to those projects, but they're overseen by field workers in Africa, who work with the organizations to develop businessplans and to make sure that they will be successful in their own revenue generating efforts."

Geggieasked any listeners who purchased something at the Oct.19 and 20 sale to double check that their transactions went through.

"If they haven't, customers can go online to our website," she said. "There they will receive instructions on how to pay us either through e-transfer or through Paypal.

"For those who would feel more comfortable paying by cheque, they can contact us at message@ujamaagrandmas.com and we'll arrange to pick up their cheques."

The next UjamaaGrandma fundraiser is a bake sale, which takes place Nov.16 and 17 at the Marda Loop Justice Film Festival.

With files from the Calgary Eyeopener

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