The Ministry of Finance has announced a draft circular encouraging the public to make their social and charitable donations by bank account transfer or electronic payment methods.

After over one year of fielding suggestions on management of such contributions, the Finance Ministry on Wednesday released its draft circular providing guidance for collection, management and expenditure of social and charitable donations as well as grants to relic sites and festive activities.

Regarding charitable donations or funding for relic site protection, donors should directly put their cash contributions into boxes for kindness, transfer their grants to the bank accounts of relic management agencies at commercial banks or state treasuries, or hand over their valuable papers to those agencies.  

In case valuable papers are certificates carrying their owners’ names, donors are required to get through the transfer procedures as prescribed by current regulations.

For donations in forms of precious metals or stones, relic management agencies are allowed to put them up for auctions or sell them to commercial banks, with proceeds from the sale recognized as cash contributions.

In the draft circular, the Finance Ministry also set forth many principles on fund-raising and receipts of charitable donations.

Accordingly, the ministry strictly prohibits taking unfair advantage of any festivals or using relic sites for individual or group interests.

All receipts and expenditures of charitable donations must be recorded fully, correctly, publicly and transparently.

Certificates of donation must be issued at the donors’ requests. 

In case a relic management agency receives a donation of VND100 million (US$4,300) or more, the agency must put it into its account at a commercial bank or a state treasury branch.

With respect to management of charity boxes, relic management agencies must regularly check and count the money inside such box on the daily, weekly or monthly basis.

Such activities must be made in writing with signatures of the keeper of the charity box key, the accountant in charge, and the representative of the security guard team at the relic site.

Donations to relic sites are intended to be spent on purchase of incense sticks, flowers, offerings, stationery and supplies; restoration or construction works; payment of wages and expenses on use of public services; and other expenses related to the relic site’s daily activities.

Expenditures from a donation must be within the relics’ internal spending regulations and the expectations of its donor.

In case the donation recipient is a religious entity as a public non-business unit, expenditures from a donation are required to meet both the donor’s expectations and the spending rules of state agencies.

Festival organizers and relic management agencies must open their bank accounts at commercial banks or state treasury branches to receive cash donations so that the receipt of and payment from such donations can be monitored.

In case the donation receiver is a state agency or a public non-business unit, it must open its account at a commercial bank to receive and manage all cash donations.

When the receiver needs to use the money, it must transfer such amount to its account at the State Treasury for the purposes of expenditure management and settlement.