March 18, 2004 | Read Time: 1 minute
Doctors Without Borders, Habitat for Humanity, and the Salvation Army earned the highest scores among 20 charities graded on their trustworthiness, according to a new survey by Harris Interactive, a research company in Rochester, N.Y.
Among those 20, Global Exchange, an international human-rights organization, Greenpeace, an environmental group, and People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals received the lowest scores from the 21,942 people surveyed last fall — meaning that respondents indicated they did not trust information from those groups as much as information from organizations that received higher scores.
Harris Interactive compiled the list of nonprofit organizations by asking 5,000 people to name two groups they thought had the best reputations and two with the worst. The charities named most frequently made the list of 20.
Harris also asked respondents whether they trust the information they receive from nonprofit organizations more than that from companies.
Eighty-two percent of respondents reserved judgment, saying their level of confidence depended on the issue and on the specific group or company providing information.
Harris conducted the survey about the reputations of nonprofit organizations as part of its fifth annual “reputation-quotient survey,” which primarily asked people about their impressions of 60 companies. This is the first survey in which Harris asked about nonprofit groups.
The 70-page report, which mostly includes information about companies and what they can do to improve their reputations among prospective customers, costs $10,000. It can be obtained by contacting Harris Interactive, 135 Corporate Woods, Rochester, N.Y. 14623-1457; (877) 919-4765; http://www.harrisinteractive.com. The company did not prepare a separate report about nonprofit groups.
