We are a non-profit organization under 501(C)(3).
We presently live and work in central Mexico.

Can we offer the names of Mexicans who want to
work legally in the USA, seasonal jobs, to American
businesses who will hire them 
and then ask the businesses to give us
a donation of $100 per worker?

Thanks.

God bless you to know and do His will!

John Pendleton

pendleton-ga:

I'm glad that you found the information I provided useful! I am
posting it here as the Answer, and would be happy to provide further
clarification if needed.

----------------------

A precedent that you may be able to refer to, here in my neck of the
woods, is the service operated by the TB Vets and the War Amps of
Canada. They provide key tags and a key return service for lost keys,
along with address labels, etc. All of these are technically free to
the end user; however, the materials accompanying the free key tags
and address labels actively solicit donations. In order to activate
the lost key return service, it is necessary to return the donation
form with all of your information. While it might be technically
possible for someone to return the form with a donation amount of
zero, I would be very surprised if more than a handful of people ever
did. Therefore, one could technically argue that the lost key service
is not free, and instead costs the value of the donation. However, the
Canadian Customs and Revenue Agency has never taken this viewpoint,
and concievably never will.

In your situation, you can do the same sort of thing by making sure
that any response forms that the corporations use also contain a
request for donations. As long as you do not directly tie the service
rendered to an obligation to remit some form of payment ('donation' or
otherwise) then you should be fine.

You may suggest a value of $100 for the donations, and provide
supporting information why this is the suggested amount (an outline of
the costs associated with the referral process, an outline of the
other services that your organization provides that makes the
referrals possible such as job training, language training, etc.).
Just don't say that the donations are expected/obligatory, and do not
say that the donations must be $100. If you do that, then the IRS and
any other tax agency would have grounds to say that you are clearly
charging $100 per referral, and then you will be obliged to
demonstrate how that $100 is fully allocated to operations so as to
leave no "profit". That's a lot harder to do than to have a clear
division between operations and donations.

-----------------------------

Again, I am glad that you found this information helpful, and am at
your disposal to provide any further clarification required.


Regards,

aht-ga
Google Answers Researcher

Dear aht-ga.  Great job!!! It was like you were just thinking out loud!
You know often in life the best answers are the naturally spoken, easy
to understand ones.  You did it.

Thank you, Lord, for ANSWERS GOOGLE  and my 500 great researchers-- thinkers!!

God bless you to know and do His will!

John Pendleton

pendleton-ga:

This is just a comment, I am not an expert in the tax rules of the
affected jurisdictions.

A precedent that you may be able to refer to, here in my neck of the
woods, is the service operated by the TB Vets and the War Amps of
Canada. They provide key tags and a key return service for lost keys,
along with address labels, etc. All of these are technically free to
the end user; however, the materials accompanying the free key tags
and address labels actively solicit donations. In order to activate
the lost key return service, it is necessary to return the donation
form with all of your information. While it might be technically
possible for someone to return the form with a donation amount of
zero, I would be very surprised if more than a handful of people ever
did. Therefore, one could technically argue that the lost key service
is not free, and instead costs the value of the donation. However, the
Canadian Customs and Revenue Agency has never taken this viewpoint,
and concievably never will.

In your situation, you can do the same sort of thing by making sure
that any response forms that the corporations use also contain a
request for donations. As long as you do not directly tie the service
rendered to an obligation to remit some form of payment ('donation' or
otherwise) then you should be fine.

Regards,

aht-ga

Oh, and just to clarify my comment...

You may suggest a value of $100 for the donations, and provide
supporting information why this is the suggested amount (an outline of
the costs associated with the referral process, an outline of the
other services that your organization provides that makes the
referrals possible such as job training, language training, etc.).
Just don't say that the donations are expected/obligatory, and do not
say that the donations must be $100. If you do that, then the IRS and
any other tax agency would have grounds to say that you are clearly
charging $100 per referral, and then you will be obliged to
demonstrate how that $100 is fully allocated to operations so as to
leave no "profit". That's a lot harder to do than to have a clear
division between operations and donations.

Dear aht-ga. You are great!!!!!!!!!!

Please,please, post your comments as the answer and I will give you 5
stars and the 5 bucks.

You and other researchers have to be cautious some times. I really
appreciate that.

when I read your first comment, I sensed: "Yeh, that's it." but with
this second one your really put on the finishing touch to a sticky
question.

Blessings.
John P.