Compassion International

We have been long time supporters of Compassion International and had loved them for over 20 years, but recently we have been very disappointed. The child we were sponsoring left the program over a year ago, but we were never notified and Compassion continued to withdraw money from our account. When we called to talk to Compassion about this (because we found out through a Facebook message from our sponsored child that he was no longer receiving services) they claim they sent us a letter of notification and in that letter let us know we would be assigned to another child. Even though it is possible that letter could have been lost in the mail, what makes no sense is that for over a year we continued to get communication from Compassion using our original sponsored child's name AND I sent Compassion an email 6 months ago asking when our child was due to age out the system and was told he still had 1 year left. When we brought this all up to the person on the phone there was still no admittance that a mistake had been made.

We sponsored two children, each the age of our children, from a young age. At first I was disappointed that the letters from them were obviously written by adults, but they were young and one can’t expected a young child to write. I waited patiently for years to have my adopted children write in their own voice, but years and years went by and this never happened. Finally, around age 17, I got a sense my child was writing to me. However, the communication was still very simple and formulaic. So honestly, after writing for more than 10 years, I barely knew anything about them, let alone their feelings. I grew suspicious, and my suspicions grew more when I’d send a big annual gift to the family, in a poor country, none less, where the exchange rate must be beneficial to them, and I’d see a lot of school supplies and clothes and comforters being purchased by them, but nothing worth the money I sent. By the time they turned 18, I cancelled my support, not wanting to leave earlier for their sake, but not crying over the end either. The whole experience left me jaded.

I used to sponsor a child. I sponsored him until he turned 21 and was no longer eligible for the program. I got letters back and forth. That was good. But in the last several years, I see a totally different Compassion International then the one that I sponsored 10 years ago. The current organization spends a lot of money on fundraising and getting people to sign up at Christian concerts. I spent $75 for a ticket. The show started at 7:00. There was a long intermission and then it was followed by a scripted sermonette by a young man that claimed to be from Africa but had really really good English and sounded like he came from down the street. He went on for a good 20 minutes about how everybody should sponsor a child in India. I was unconvinced that he was telling the truth about anything that he was saying. It all seemed very much like an infomercial. I can't believe how disappointing that it was to have this time taken up by this infomercial at a concert I had paid to see. The most telling thing was that at the end of the infomercial in a crowd of 15,000 people that no hands went up to sponsor a child. This is a Christian concert. This is a room filled with Christians. We have compassion on children living in poverty. But we don't understand why we have to pay for a concert and then be bombarded by an infomercial for a company that is paying its Administration millions of dollars every year in salaries. My $39 a month is padding pockets and not really benefiting children overseas. Back when I sponsored those two kids one in Africa and one in South America I received letters and I know that that they were being helped. But the Compassion International I saw at that concert is a different company. More concerned about fundraising than about children. No one in that crowd raised their hand. I think it's time to stop fundraising for Compassion International at concerts. People pay good money to hear the music and are forced to sit through an infomercial because Compassion International has most likely paid for the advertising time. They're most likely paying for the people who are passing out the cards. The radio stations were handing out free gifts. But compassion was definitely just shamelessly begging for us to pay those large salaries. It was really disappointing to have to sit through it. I no longer have confidence in Compassion International.

My family has been sponsoring a girl in Peru since 2015. We have been consistently writing her and donating extra money where we could. I was a little upset when we wanted to send her a bike and the CI said that the bike would be given to another needy family based on the CI decisions. So we just gave our sponsored girl money instead. Pictures came back of this girl holding up items that the letter said she purchased with the money we gave. Over time and as we sent more letters to her, it became clear that the letters appeared very "canned". There was never any mention of comments from our previous letters and I really could not tell if she was receiving our letters at all. I was really hoping to hear about her life in Peru and learn something about her life and life in Peru in general. I wrote letters, attached pictures ... her responses were always about Lord and God being great but really nothing personal nor any response to my detailed letters. That got me thinking if she was even receiving my letters! When I called the headquarters, they pretended to be looking things up and were full of excuses and information that were not logical. I looked up salaries of the management 990 (this site wont let me post a url so google to see site shows the amount of salaries these people make and I am horrified. I have also posted the last one that is showing from 2019 (2020 and 2021 say unavailable to download. I'm sure they are making a lot more money than 2019. My family is very sad that they are taking advantage of people and we will be stopping our donations to this company.

I had been contributing to Compassion for decades. Over my time with them, I sponsored four children. In the beginning, it was fine. Then, I noticed that they constantly sent packets of ways to give more money. That is a red flag that an organization is too focused on collecting money. When your child times out, they automatically assign you another child and keep taking your money. I called to make them switch that on my account, and it worked for a while, but then when my last child timed out, it happened again. All of my previous children timed out at 18, but my last child timed out at 22. I don't remember being informed of this upfront. Their marketing is slick to pull on your heartstrings, better than most secular organizations. It gave me a suspicion of the organization overall. You cannot close your account on the website and must speak to a "representative". Once they have you, they don't want to let you go and employ guileful tactics to keep you.

Signed up to sponsor at a Christian concert it was a little girl and we sponsored her until after years they sent a letter stating that her family moved and she could no longer be in the program. They sent another photo of a different girl and without asking just kept taking money from the credit card. This continued but raised a red flag as to how you would cancel if they don’t even give you the option of if you want to continue your sponsorship with. So fast forward more time goes by and no way to contact anyone. This year my husband suffered a severe debilitating stroke and isn’t able to work anymore and if someone hadn’t made a false charge on his credit card that I had to dispute and cancel the card Compassion International would still be making decisions about my finances without my approval!

Sponsored a girl for many years when we were informed that she had left the program. We thought that was the end of it and were not going to sponsor another child as we were turning towards another charity that works here in the United States. I received a letter 3 weeks after being told of our sponsorship ending stating that we had agreed to sponsor another girl. At no point did we authorize this payment to Compassion. When you call them they act like they don't know how it happened. They make it impossible to cancel, act like you are a bad guy for canceling a sponsorship for a child in need you never signed up for, and generally giving you the run around so you get tired and give up. This is not a good Christian organization. They refuse to help in any way when you have an issue. Stay away and spend your money elsewhere. They will try to hoodwink you and your charitable giving.

I donated to this organization for 11 years. My child grew out of the program and it wasn't until I received her letter saying goodbye that I realized she hadn't been receiving my uploaded letters over more than a year due to a malfunction in their website. The website would confirm receipt of my letters but never produce them to send to the child. The expiration date of her leaving hadn't happened yet but they purged her and my membership log in area where the letters I wrote her had been stored. Since my log in was purged, so were my letters. Then they asked me to give them a waiver that they could give her my address to stay in touch since she was out of the program and invited me to write a nice final letter which they would pass on to her. I wrote her the letter promptly and sent them two copies of the waiver (emailed where they told me to send it the day they requested it) and sent a copy of the waiver with my final letter in the mail. Well they sent her part of my letter but left out the parts about how to contact me and my heartfelt comments in that section because they said they didn't have my waiver. ? It was attached to my letter. They couldn't confirm what part of my final letter they gave her because they didn't have a copy any longer, so no one could say what was translated for her. This was all within a week of their receiving everything. Needless to say I was heart broken that they washed their hands of all of it, refused to help me over their mistakes of a malfunctioning website that confirmed they got my letters but never sent them to her AND botching up my final letter to Maria. I requested that they please resend (translate) my heartfelt letter and send it to make sure she understands I wish to stay in touch. They refused to try to do anything . How is this called "Compassion"? They are not interested in relationships.....only wanted me to sponsor another child and wash hands of years of writing to this girl in South America. I could sign up to send them money for another child. Sorry, not breaking my heart again. Management here has no desire to solve their own errors - very poorly run.

I believe they are scamming people, my mother gave 140$ a month for years. Upon her death all accounts were closed. When they couldn’t charge her card, they sent bills with late fees. After the phone call to them notifying them we owe them nothing, this is a charitable organization and that my mother passed away, they threatened to send the bills to collection’s.

We began sponsoring a child after a Casting Crowns concert. We randomly picked a child and a young boy was selected. We received a picture and a single name and everything seemed good. We recently received a letter that the child had moved and Compassion International no longer served this child. In the letter was a photo of our child but the name was different. I was so very suspicious. I called in and they tried to explain the reason but it still did not make sense so we cancelled our sponsorship and are going back to World Vision.

I have four children I give to in compassion but then I noticed one letter was clearly not the girl I'd been writing for years the handwriting was not hers the communication style she actually reintroduce herself like we had never talked before ! and the drawing was clearly not like all her other letters something's wrong and I tend to find out who's forging the kids letters!

Felt like for personal reasons my family is being discriminated against because of our past. Felt like they were marketing to me. Advocate told me that I "wrote too much and that can beoverwhelming for the families" even though that goes agaisnt what all of their marketing to me stands for. I would not reccomend the heartbreak of ending the sponsorships and taking the photos off of the wall to anyone.

My wife and daughter each have been sponsoring an individual child for the past 8 years. My wife went on line to provide additional donations to her child for christmas. Discovered her sponsorship, and my daughters were cancelled due to an offense I COMMITTED 20 years ago. So much for Christian values and forgiveness. 2 kids, 8 years, 75.00 a month. Over 7000.00 donated. SPCA will be pleased.

I’m so heart broke, I had signed up to sponsor a child. 1st I kept having them say a boy then things saying they were a girl. 2nd my sponorship was abruptly cancelled b/c they didn’t think I gave enough. $ 3rd This has let me down also the child and their family. I can’t even say good by and it wasn’t my choice to leave.

Being on the inside and also a past sponsor, please do not support this ministry financially. There is a lot of deception and darkness in this place. Money is spent outrageously and sponsors are lied to (with employees even encouraged to not be fully transparent) just to name a couple of things. Please pray heavily for this ministry.