WHY PAY TO VOLUNTEER?

Why do I have to pay to volunteer or do an internship abroad?

We sometimes get asked this question. You might wonder why, as you are providing your time, effort, and skills for free, you might even need to pay on top of this?

The short answer to this question is: Because costs occur that have to be covered by someone.

Many volunteers and even interns only see the direct costs that occur during their stay abroad, such as accommodation, meals, and transportation. However, the costs for high-quality volunteering and internship services abroad include much more!

This article will explain the costs that arise and why it is the volunteers/interns themselves who have to cover these costs.

Which costs apply?

Our program developer, Nozomi Tsuji, on Sado Island in Japan, is dedicating a considerable amount of time to maintain positive relations with the local population. Sado Island is a relatively closed and conservative society, and Nozomi's efforts are essential in building trust with the locals. This trust is instrumental in opening doors to many interesting activities we organize for our volunteers as part of the Sado Mother Nature program.

Program development, selection and support of suitable project partners and local infrastructure

Finding suitable projects abroad and ensuring successful long-term cooperation with them requires a significant effort. This effort aims to meet the wishes and needs of various stakeholders, including:

• The foreign volunteers/interns

• The project that receives volunteers/interns (e.g., a school)

• The beneficiaries of the project where volunteers/interns are active (e.g., the students of the school)

• The community in which the programs take place (e.g., the village in which the school is located)

• Authorities involved (e.g., the ministry of education that has to approve cooperation with the school; or the immigration authorities or labor authorities)

This list can be extended to partners that provide logistics, such as:

• Landlords of rental accommodation

• Host families

• Transportation providers

Since this often involves individuals from very different cultural backgrounds, with different expectations and often also from very different education levels, it is a complex task. A lot of time needs to be invested in relationship building and maintaining relationships with all involved stakeholders, often including expenses, such as for gifts, contributions, etc.

We act as a bridge between the various interested groups and must satisfy them all.

All of these aspects, as a responsible provider of placements abroad, cannot be resolved by simply visiting the location once; they require permanent feedback processes and relationship management. This necessitates experienced and qualified staff, who receive a suitable salary for their work, and for whom further work-related expenses such as communication and travel costs apply.

First aid training of our team members in Zanzibar carried out by Dr. Jenny Bouraima at the Urban Care Clinic.

Consultation, preparation, and support of participants

Our staff answers a large number of emails, messages, phone calls, etc., every day, including weekends and holidays, to address inquiries from prospective and confirmed participants. To plan and organize your stay abroad, they also communicate with our local staff in the host countries and directly with the projects. They need to be appropriately qualified, not only to provide qualified consultation and plan your stay abroad but also to stay up-to-date on constantly changing details about the placements and topics such as visas, labor issues, scholarships, or university requirements for participants from many countries.

Of course, these staff members receive a proper salary, and there are costs associated with office infrastructure (space, hardware, software, electricity, communication costs, etc.).

We put a lot of effort into the preparation of our participants and regularly update many preparation documents. We conduct preparation sessions via zoom for all participants and regularly train our staff to ensure they are professionally qualified to support our participants. The amount of information we process is extensive, requiring significant effort to always keep this information up-to-date and process it for interested individuals and participants to guarantee customized consultation and support.

For quality reasons, at most locations, we work with our own support staff and not with external partners. This allows us to maintain direct contact with our local projects, differentiating us from many other providers of internships and volunteering abroad. There is a personal support staff for you at your destination, an orientation and introduction at your location, accompaniment to your placement on your first day, and 24-hour accessibility of the local support team for emergencies, among other services. This often keeps our coordinators busy around the clock.

As a participant, you may often underestimate the effort needed to provide this kind of support. Some participants also overestimate their abilities to manage at the destination without any support, only realizing upon arrival how valuable it is to have someone to rely on.

We train our worldwide on-site staff regularly in important aspects such as communication skills and safety.

The work that goes into communication with and support of our participants significantly helps our partners that we arrange volunteering and internships with (e.g. a school or a hospital). They often lack sufficient resources in terms of time, staff, and finances to communicate with and prepare volunteers/interns before their arrival and support them on-site with issues that are not directly related to their work. They outsource such tasks to us and can instead focus all their energy on their actual project work.

Marketing

The best programs and intentions of local projects are meaningless if nobody knows about their existence. This makes marketing necessary. You are reading this text on our website, which means costs have already been incurred, not only for creating and regularly updating this website and its contents but also for activities such as search engine optimization, protection against hackers and technical updates.

When it comes to spreading our word into the world, we have to compete with 'more commercial' providers that are much stronger financially and aim to push us down in the search engine results. If you found our website through a link or listing on another website, we usually have to pay the operator of the other website for each 'lead' or click that brings visitors to our website, or they ask us to pay commissions if you eventually book through us. Also making videos, images, and writing up social media contents requires paid staff. If you know us from an event, there are costs for joining the event, setting up a booth, travel, printed materials, and staff. If you have read about us in a printed magazine, we generally have to pay to be featured there.

We believe it is not correct to spend large amounts on marketing that could be better used to benefit projects that exist for a good and charitable cause. If these costs did not exist, we could potentially lower the cost of your volunteer or internship placement. Unfortunately, marketing costs are necessary for us to exist and survive as an organization because without them, we would simply not have any participants.

And more costs!

In all countries where we operate, we are, of course, registered as fully legal entities. This means, we need to do tax accounting and pay taxes, tax consulting and nonwage labor costs. There are legal expenses, e.g. for labor lawyers who make sure papers for volunteers or interns in your host country are correctly processed. There are costs for administration, insurances (e.g. company liability insurance), and related to payments (e.g., banking fees, international transfers, costs for currency exchange and currency fluctuations; also accepting payments via credit card and PayPal isn't free for us).

Who should cover these costs?

Very few charitable projects, especially those in developing countries, have the financial means to do so. Also, in terms of sustainable local development, it wouldn't make much sense to cover the costs related to short-time foreign volunteers or interns, because if a local project had the financial means, it could instead hire local staff. Local staff would stay for a longer duration and be familiar with the local circumstances. Local employees are probably also easier to satisfy than volunteers coming from more developed countries and having higher expectations about their living standards. For instance, a nurse in Zanzibar makes 200-300 USD per month, an amount that allows her to lead only a relatively simple life. The expectations that foreign volunteers and interns might have regarding accommodation and meals cannot be covered with the salary of such a Zanzibari nurse.

In the case of internships with commercial organizations (e.g., hotels), accommodation and meals are often provided. In some countries, there may also be a stipend or salary. If accommodation costs apply to you, we strive to keep them low, just like our program fees.

Why doesn't World Unite! cover my costs?

World Unite! does not collect donations and does not receive government aid. We are an independent provider of educational travel services that is neither religious nor political nor representing any lobby group.

Fortunately, there are some funding opportunities available, such as scholarships that you can apply for.