23 June 2020 The compassion and faithfulness of Barnabas Fund supporters are an immense blessing to our suffering brothers and sisters around the world. Through our established and vetted network of partners and churches, your gifts and prayers have changed the lives of many, giving them a hope and a future (Jer. 29:11).
We have become aware of a number of supporters who, through their kindness and love, have responded financially to requests they have received in unsolicited emails and Facebook messages from men and women in “ministry” who ask for donations to help their cause.
Whilst we appreciate that some of these requests may indeed be legitimate, it is clear that a significant number of these requests are in fact fraudulent and scams. Some are posing as church leaders and even use photos taken from local churches to further their claims. Others are claiming to be converts and talk about the persecution they are experiencing.
With this in mind, we would urge extreme caution if you are contacted by an unknown person(s) by email, Facebook or other social media, especially if they are asking you to send them money by any method.
Barnabas Fund takes the stewardship of God’s money very seriously, and we are highly regulated by the government and charity authorities in the UK and all the countries we work in. There is clear and extensive legislation which requires due diligence to be conducted on each recipient of grants, and this legislation includes clear penalties if breached. We have to take these matters very seriously. All our partners around the world have been through our strict due diligence.
In some cases it is illegal to send money to certain countries due to international sanctions. In some cases, the donor may be liable for prosecution if funds are even unwittingly given to individuals or organisations associated with terrorism.
Some supporters have contacted Barnabas Fund to ask us to check whether a request they have been sent is genuine. We are now receiving an increasing number of such enquiries, but unfortunately we do not have the resources to perform this time-consuming and delicate task on such a scale. Thank you for your understanding that we can no longer assist with such enquiries. But we can put it on record that almost all of those we did check in the past turned out to be fraudulent.
We urge extreme caution.
