AN AIR AMBULANCE SERVICE THAT DOESN’T OWN A HELICOPTER is being exposed and brought to task in Great Britain this month. The so-called charity calls itself the Northern Ireland Air Ambulance Service and also refers to itself as “Alpha-5.”
Alpha-5 has been soliciting money throughout the UK for three years, but BBC News has disclosed that 86% of all the money raised has gone to paying for the fund-raising effort and toward salaries of the executives. The Air Ambulance Association says that genuine air ambulance operations typically spend about 20% of their donated income on administrative costs and the rest goes for operating the helicopter.
BBC also found cases of apparent misrepresentation including this example:
In December 2006, the charity sent a letter to a supermarket chain asking for permission to raise funds in its car parks.
The letter seeking the permission to collect outside a major store also said “Alpha 5 has pilots in your area” who “would very much like to collect for the charity in your store”. It added, “our aircrew will be in full uniform”. At the time the letter was written, the charity did not – and still does not – have a helicopter.
The letter also gave the address of the charity as: “Alpha 5 Headquarters, Belfast City Airport.” We asked Belfast City Airport to check its records, but it could not find any evidence that the charity had been headquartered there.
In a statement it said: “The Alpha 5 ambulance charity never had an office, PO Box or any premises at Belfast City Airport.”
As they say, “Wait…there’s more!” Read the entire report on this nationwide scam on BBC News’ page HERE and take advantage of their links to other related articles about this fantasy flight on their right sidebar.
Firegeezer notes that it appears as though the UK has far less-stringent oversight of solicitations than we have in North America.
