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Comment by noinput | Hacker News Reader

I like it. I was [almost] an Acorns user because I dig the model of simple round-ups, but am too impatient to wait for small change to make a difference in my personal savings alone. To that note, I know pennies go a long way especially when combined with others to who needs them.

Feedback: Let users pick their own charities. I can tell by your FAQ you want to curate but people need to know their efforts are going to what they care about. I have personal experience with exactly this on a current startup, email me [in profile] if you want to chat more on it.

Congrats on launching something that matters to you!

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Thanks for the feedback!

Yes - this is definitely a big philosophical discussion we are having.

(Time for some sausage making) in California it is actually illegal for us to give money to a charity without having a signed contract in place (this is to protect consumers and guarantee that the money we promise is actually going to charities). This puts a bit of a hamper on enabling donations to all charities. We've opted for curated charities to keep compliant and also to help those new to charity donating make a big impact immediately.

With that said, we want to expand the number of charities we support and would love to hear about great charities!

Then how about you let the users choose among your list of charities?

You get to choose from our charity list which one you'd like to donate to - Let me know if I need to make that more clear on the website :)

You do. ;)

Feedback received :D

Hm, I'd love to hear more about the illegal thing you cited. My startup lets everyone choose, all we require is an EIN and there's no paperwork, and it's all been approved by my legal.

I've been through some various business types in the space, the worst was a registered Commercial Fundraiser where yes I had to setup bonds and the fees were ridiculous with individual filing between charity and state. But for you (and me actually) it doesn't seem as big of a deal until it hits scale. If you're referring to registrations for "Charitable Solicitation", we've been through that too. I quickly asked my legal and he responded with: as long as you're not specifically targeting persons in any state nor do you supply names and contact info for donors to the charities so they can't send thank you notes it's not an issue. YMMV and don't hold me to that, but it may not be a big issue for you and open up a new avenue.

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