We hope you can find the answers to any questions you have. If you can't please feel free to contact us.

Information about The Children’s Society and our online shop

What is our online shop and how can you use it?

Our online shop is the go-to place for resources to help you support The Children's Society. Discover everything you need for a wonderful Christingle service, fundraising tools, and valuable resources on children's wellbeing and school experiences. The online shop has a mixture of physical and downloadable resources to suit your needs. We have divided the resources into the following three types: Christingle, General fundraising and Other resources – if you know the name of the resource you’re looking for you might find it useful to use our search bar to be taken directly to it.

Once you have chosen your resources, you will be asked to provide details to ensure they get to you. All of the items on this site are free, we ask that if you are ordering physical items we ask you to cover the postage of the order at the fixed cost of £4.95 no matter the size of the order. Items which are digital downloads will be sent straight to your email address.

How can I find out more about the work of The Children’s Society?

We have lots of information about our work with children and young people on our website, but if you have any questions, feel free to ring our friendly Supporter Care team on 0300 303 7000 or email them at [email protected].

How can I find more information about fundraising for The Children’s Society?

If you’re not yet sure how you could fundraise, we have lots of great ideas on our website as well as challenge events you can register for such as runs, treks and other challenges. Alternatively, our Supporter Care team will be happy to answer any questions either by phone 0300 303 7000 or email them at [email protected].

Delivery

When is the last day I can order products?

Last postage orders will go out on the 17th of December so please plan in advance for Christingle services in December and January.

How long does it take for products to be delivered?

Typical delivery times are 7 to 10 working days although we will endeavor to deliver items sooner. Please order as far in advance of your Christingle celebration as possible, it is a very busy time of year for post and parcels so ordering early will help avoid disappointment. Please get in touch to discuss the progress of your order if needed - on 0203 832 7240 or email [email protected]. quoting your order number.

If you order additional items on top of a starter pack, these may be delivered at different times and in different packages.

My order has been lost or damaged in the post

For all damaged, lost or faulty resources please get in touch with us by calling 0203 832 7240 or emailing [email protected]. quoting your order number and we will be happy to send replacements free of charge.

Why has the cost of postage increased this year?

Due to ever increasing postage costs, as well as increasing costs of the resources, we have made the difficult decision to increase our postage costs to £4.95. Please be rest assured this decision was not taken lightly, and every penny raised from Christingle services go to help more children and young people receive the support they need.

Can I order resources to ship outside of the UK?

Due to the costs involved with international shipping, we only send fundraising resources to addresses within the UK (except Channel Islands). We are sorry for any inconvenience this may cause.

Cancelling your order

If you need to cancel your order after you have placed it, please get in touch on 0203 832 7240 or email [email protected]. quoting your order number.

Environment and sustainability

All paper-based resources are made from recyclable materials. We encourage all organisers and participants to recycle or reuse as many resources as possible, to minimise wastage and negative environmental impact.

Gift Aid

When you reach the checkout for your order you may see an option to add a donation or Gift Aid. Adding a donation to your order is completely optional but allows us to continue our vital work to protect children and young people. When making a donation you will be asked whether you would like to claim Gift Aid. If you pay income tax then adding Gift Aid allows us to claim an extra 25p for every £1 donated. We greatly appreciate your fundraising for The Children’s Society so do not feel the donation is mandatory.

Account help

How to create an account

You can create an account to speed up the process of creating an order on the online shop. The account feature will allow you to save your payment and address information for speedy checkout and it will keep a record of your orders that you can revisit.

If you haven’t already, please create a new log in by selecting ‘Account sign in’ in the top right hand corner of the site and navigate to 'New customers' and click ‘Create an Account’. If you have already created a new account and still can’t log in, please use the ‘forgotten password’ link to reset your password.

Downloadable resources

Some of the items on the online shop and in the form of digital downloads rather than physical copies, you are welcome to download these are print them as many times as necessary or read them online. You will be emailed an order confirmation that will include a link to download the resource you’ve ordered. If you’ve created an account, the download will also be available to download from your account area.

Confirmation of order email

If you haven’t received your confirmation of order email, please do check your spam and junk folders for your confirmation email. If you still haven’t received it, please contact us.

Register your Christingle event

Registering your Christingle event on our website allows other Christinglers to hear about your service and donate online if they choose to. By registering your event you will have an event page with its own link to share via social media or across your networks. The event will then be searchable via postcode in our ‘Find a Christingle service near you’ page.

How do I register my Christingle event?

You can register your Christingle by submitting the events deatils on our website. We have tried to make this form as quick as possible for you to fill out, whilst ensuring the key details of the event are included. From this year you can set up cashless donations when you register your event. Your event will be reviewed by our team and when it has been approved it will be published, we aim to complete this process within 1-5 days. You will receive a confirmation email when your event is published and ready to be shared.

Cashless donations via mobile

From 2024 we are working with a provider called givestar to enable you to take donations through a mobile phone at your service. Many people attending Christingle services will appreciate the opportunity to give a donation without cash and with cashless donations attendees can simply tap their card to your phone to make a donation. You can read more about cashless donations, known as ‘Boost Donate’ by givestar by clicking here.

What is required to accept cashless donations?

In order to be able to accept donations via a mobile phone you will need to download the free Givestar app on an Apple device running iOS software 16.7 or later, on iPhone XS, iPhone 11 or above or an Android device running Android 11 or above, each phone must have NFC capability.

How do I set up cashless donations?

When registering your event on our website, please select yes in the cashless giving box. This will automatically create a shareable givestar fundraising page and you'll be sent guidance via email on how to set up 'tap to phone' donations. It's completely secure and no personal information will be stored on your phone.

We highly recommend registering your event on our website so that other Christinglers can find your event, but you are also able to set up cashless donations via givestar directly by following their process which is available by clicking here.

Do the cashless donations reach children and young people?

All of the funds collected through this method will be automatically transferred to The Children’s Society by givestar and will go towards directly improving the lives of children and young people.

Pay in your donations

We’ve made fundraising at your Christingle celebration as easy as possible. The safest and easiest way for you to take in collections during your service is through your very own online donation page, and you can create one by registering your Christingle event with us. This page will also allow you to set up the ability to accept cashless donations via mobile at your services.

Follow these instructions on how to pay in your Christingle donations, physically or online.

Changes to resources

Why does the red tape have The Children’s Society branding on it?

The inclusion of our branding on the tape was not intended to detract from its symbolic meaning, but an attempt to create more awareness of The Children’s Society and our work. We have had feedback from supporters at previous Christingles that this is not as obvious as it could be, and something they would like to see more of.

We tried to make this as subtle as possible, remaining sensitive to the meaning of the ribbon and tradition of Christingle. The branding is only on one side and can be flipped over if required. As a charity reliant on the goodwill of supporters and members of the public to fund our work, supporting some of the most vulnerable young people as they face life’s biggest challenges, it’s never our intention to upset or offend. Non-branded red tape can be ordered from our online shop, and is also available to buy at craft retailers, garden centers and Amazon.com.

If you do order non-brand red tape from our shop as a replacement item, a charge of £4.95 for postage will still be applicable.

I can’t find the resource I am looking for

When resources become available we endeavor to get them live on this site as soon as possible. On occasion, the resource you are looking for may no longer be being produced – we always welcome feedback on resources that our supporters find useful, so please get in touch with Supporter Care on 0300 303 7000 or [email protected].

If you want to know when a specific resource will be available again, call 0300 303 7000.

Christmas cards and eBay shop

If you would like to purchase Children’s Society Christmas cards please visit our charity Christmas card shop.

We also operate an eBay shop that sells new and used items with the funds directly supporting our work.

Is your question still not answered? We will be happy to help if you give us a call on 0300 303 7000 or email  [email protected].