Time for a Cuppa frequently asked questions

Time for a Cuppa is Dementia UK’s annual tea party fundraising event. It’s a fantastic way to get together with friends, family or colleagues to share cake and a cuppa and raise vital funds for families facing dementia. 

Making Time for a Cuppa couldn’t be easier – simply pick a date, choose your venue and invite your guests. You can hold an event wherever you like: at home, at work, in a care home or in your local community.  

You can chat and share ideas with your fellow hosts by joining our Time for a Cuppa Facebook Group. 

Time for a Cuppa week is 1st-8th May 2023, but you can hold your event on any date that suits you.

Your fundraising pack will be sent second class and can take up to 10 working days to arrive. If you need your pack sooner, please get in touch by emailing timeforacuppa@dementiauk.org or calling 020 8036 5380. 

If your pack hasn’t arrived after 10 working days, please get in touch so we can send a replacement out. 

There are also lots of extra fundraising materials available to download here.

If there’s anything else you need, please get in touch and we’ll see if we can help.

There are lots of ways you can spread the word about your event:

1. Use the poster in your fundraising pack and the invitations available here.
2. Text, WhatsApp or email all your friends and family, and share the details on social media. There are two invites available which you can use when posting about your event: download the square invite and rectangular invite
3. If your event is open to the public, you can use our press release template to send to your local media. We’ve also created some posters that you can put up in your area to direct people to your event.

The simplest way to raise much-needed funds is to ask for donations for cuppas and cakes. You can either set prices or ask guests to donate an amount of their choice and Gift Aid their donation (which means we’ll get an extra 25p for every £1 donated, at no extra cost to you or your supporters).

Many of our Cuppa hosts prefer to ask for donations – you’ll be amazed how generous people can be when they know it’s for a good cause.

We recommend you set up an online fundraising page as well as collecting cash donations so anyone who can’t attend still has a way to donate.

There are lots of other ways to raise extra funds at your event:

• raffles and tombolas are always popular and previous hosts have told us they’re a great way to raise lots of money. If you’d like to organise a raffle, we’ve included a letter of authority in your pack that you can use to source prizes from local businesses
• you could also organise some tea party games where your guests can donate to play – we have some games you can download
• why not have a stall to sell things such as homemade crafts or second-hand items?

Want some extra fundraising tips? We have more ideas here.

Setting up a JustGiving page is as easy as one, two, tea!  

1. Visit justgiving.com/campaign/timeforacuppa2022 and click ‘Start fundraising’ 
2. Create your JustGiving page. Add a photo, a description of why you’re taking part, and a fundraising target – people who set a goal tend to raise 46% more
3. Share your fundraising link by email, text, and on social media. You can write the link to your page on the ‘donate’ poster, and you can even download and print copies of your QR code so people can donate more easily on the day

It’s really that simple – and you don’t even need to worry about sending us your donations, as JustGiving will do it automatically. 

You can either price your bakes individually or let guests donate an amount of their choice. If you would like us to be able to claim Gift Aid on donations collected at your event, your guests must be free to give a donation of their choice as we cannot claim Gift Aid on direct proceeds of a sale. 

There is a Gift Aid form in your fundraising pack, and you can download extra copies here. Your guests will need to complete every column on the form in their own handwriting and tick to confirm that they want to Gift Aid their donation. 

We can’t claim Gift Aid on donations from raffles, auctions, entry fees, ticket sales or competitions. 

In the past 12 years, our amazing Time for a Cuppa hosts have raised over £1,188,000 for families facing dementia. That’s enough to fund approximately 20 brand new Admiral Nurse services, supporting people with dementia in their local communities.

Your support means so much – and by taking part in Time for a Cuppa, you’re helping to ensure no family faces dementia alone.

• £15 could cover the telephone costs of five families calling our free national Dementia Helpline
• £30 could fund a new Admiral Nurse in an acute hospital for an hour
• £60 could pay for an Admiral Nurse to offer two hours of virtual clinics to families
• £255 could fund in-depth specialist support for eight families contacting our Helpline
• £1,125 could fund a new Admiral Nurse supporting people from under-served communities for a week

Every cuppa you pour and penny you raise will help our nurses bring their life-changing support to families facing dementia when they need it most.

There are lots of ways you can pay in the money you raised – click here to find out how.  

The sooner you send in your donations, the sooner we can put them to work helping families facing dementia. 

Any money you raise online through a JustGiving page will be sent to us directly so you don’t need to do anything.