TOEIC Link Charity Drive Vocabulary: The Announce-Pledge-Match-Report Cluster for Part 4 and Part 7

Many companies run a yearly charity donation drive. Employees give money, food or supplies, and the company often adds its own contribution through a matching gift program. In workplace documents the process has four stages: the campaign is announced, employees pledge or donate, the company matches eligible gifts, and organizers report the results.

TOEIC Link materials use this cluster because the documents are full of limits and conditions. A notice sets the dates and the drop-off points. A policy page explains which gifts qualify for a match and up to what amount. A thank-you email reports totals that combine employee gifts and company money. The central trap is the match. The company will match donations almost always means up to a certain amount, for certain organizations, if the request is submitted on time.

Volunteer events that run alongside a drive use the corporate volunteer day and volunteer time off cluster. Payroll deductions follow the language of the payroll and pay stub cluster, and company-funded community events overlap with the corporate sponsorship and event partnership cluster.

Why the exam likes this cluster

There are several ways to give. A drive may accept cash, online donations, payroll deductions and physical items. Questions ask which method is not accepted or which one requires a form.

Matches have limits. A company may match gifts one-to-one up to $500 per employee per year. Questions ask how much the company will add to a given donation.

Totals combine sources. A final report may give employee donations, the company match and a grand total. Questions ask for one of those figures, and wrong choices use another.

Stage 1 — announcing the drive

Verbs and collocations: launch a giving campaign, kick off the annual drive, set a fundraising goal, designate collection points, recruit department volunteers, run from November 1 to November 30.

Nouns: giving campaign, fundraising goal, collection bin, drop-off point, beneficiary, campaign coordinator, kickoff event.

Beneficiary is the organization or group that receives the donations. This year's beneficiary is the Riverside Community Food Bank. A question asking who will receive the items points here, not to the company or the coordinator.

Collection bin and drop-off point name where physical donations go. Collection bins are located in the lobby of each building; perishable food cannot be accepted. Questions often ask what employees should not bring.

Fundraising goal is the target amount. Our goal is to raise $40,000, an increase of 25 percent over last year. A choice using last year's total confuses the two figures.

Stage 2 — pledging and donating

Verbs and collocations: make a pledge, donate online, set up a payroll deduction, give a one-time gift, spread a donation over six pay periods, receive a tax receipt.

Nouns: pledge, pledge form, payroll deduction, one-time gift, recurring donation, donation portal, tax receipt.

Pledge is a promise to give a certain amount, sometimes paid later. Employees who pledge by November 15 will be entered into a prize drawing. A choice saying employees must pay the full amount by November 15 misreads a pledge as a payment.

Payroll deduction means the donation is taken from the employee's paycheck. Deductions will begin with the first paycheck in January and continue for six pay periods. Questions ask when the money will first be taken.

Tax receipt is a document showing the donation for tax purposes. Receipts for online gifts are emailed immediately; receipts for payroll gifts appear on your year-end pay statement. Questions test which method produces which receipt.

Stage 3 — matching gifts

Verbs and collocations: match donations dollar for dollar, submit a matching request, verify a donation, cap the match at $500, double an employee's gift, exclude certain organizations.

Nouns: matching gift, match ratio, annual cap, eligible organization, registered charity, matching request form, verification.

Match ratio tells how much the company gives for each dollar. The company matches gifts at a ratio of 2:1 for the food bank and 1:1 for all other eligible charities. A question asking how much the company adds to a $100 food bank gift wants $200.

Annual cap is the maximum match per employee per year. Matching gifts are capped at $1,000 per employee per calendar year. An employee who gives $1,500 receives a $1,000 match, not $1,500.

Eligible organization means a group that qualifies for a match. Registered charities qualify; political groups and religious services do not. Questions ask which donation would not be matched.

Stage 4 — reporting results

Verbs and collocations: exceed the goal, fall short of the target, announce the final total, thank participating employees, recognize the top department, deliver donations to the beneficiary.

Nouns: final tally, participation rate, grand total, company contribution, in-kind donation, thank-you event.

Participation rate is the percentage of employees who gave. Participation reached 68 percent, up from 52 percent last year. A question asking how many employees donated may need a headcount mentioned elsewhere.

In-kind donation is a gift of goods or services rather than money. In addition to cash gifts, employees contributed 1,200 kilograms of in-kind donations. A choice adding the kilograms to the dollar total is wrong.

Exceed means go above. We exceeded our goal by $6,000. If the goal was $40,000, the total raised is $46,000, not $6,000.

The five traps, in the order they appear

1. Last year's total read as this year's goal. Check which year a number refers to.
2. Pledge read as payment. A pledge can be paid later.
3. Match read as unlimited. Look for the cap and the ratio.
4. Any charity read as eligible. Check the exclusions.
5. Employee total read as grand total. Separate donations from the company match.

A worked sequence

A Part 7 triple passage begins with an email from the campaign coordinator at an insurance company. The annual giving campaign runs from November 3 to November 28 and supports two beneficiaries: a children's hospital and a regional food bank. The goal is $60,000. Employees can give online, set up payroll deductions or bring canned food to collection bins in the cafeteria.

The second document is the matching gift policy. The company matches employee gifts one-to-one up to $750 per employee per year. Gifts to the food bank are matched two-to-one during the campaign period only. Matching requests for online gifts must be submitted within 30 days of the donation.

The third document is a text message exchange. Employee Grace Lin writes that she donated $300 online to the food bank on November 10 and asks whether it is too late to request a match on December 20. The coordinator replies that the deadline passed on December 10, but because she gave during the campaign, she can still ask human resources to review the request.

Questions follow the stages. What is one way employees can donate? Bring canned food to the cafeteria. How much would the company add to a $200 gift to the children's hospital? $200. What would the company add to Ms. Lin's gift if her request were approved? $600, because food bank gifts are matched two-to-one and the amount is under the $750 cap. Why is Ms. Lin's request late? It was not submitted within 30 days. A choice saying her donation is not eligible is wrong; the timing, not the organization, is the problem.

What to drill

For every charity drive passage, note four things: the dates, goal and beneficiary, the accepted ways to give and what each requires, the match ratio, cap, eligible organizations and request deadline, and which figure in the report is employee giving, company matching or the combined total. Most wrong answers in this cluster ignore a limit or mix up two numbers from different parts of the document.