Some time back I questioned about JW making money from doing relief work for disasters. I found this story on reddit and also noted some of the replies. It makes me wonder how many would have left their own jobs and paid their way, giving free labor and some supplying free materials if they had know what was going on behind the scenes. Do any of you have a story in regard to this?https://www.reddit.com/r/exjw/comments/caqhvq/natural_disaster_relief_work_a_scam_my_familys/
JW profit from disasters
by enoughisenough 34 Replies latest watchtower beliefs
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Atlantis
enoughisenough:
This is a good subject! I have the Manual in English and Spanish with instructions for asking for insurance checks. I think it's over by the Captain Crunch cereal box. I'll get it for you if you want it. (Elders told me in the past, that this practice of disaster relief was plain and simple insurance "fraud")
Grandpa!
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TonusOH
Interesting thread. I don't know what RBC is, though.
And I can only imagine the kind of career that the poster's father passed on. If he had that many skills --including implementation of SAP in the 1990s!-- he could have made a ton of money by not donating so much of his time and knowledge and energy to the WTS. And all the while attending meetings that made him 'uncomfortable.'
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Beth Sarim
Tonus
RBC,,, I think it could be relating to the former Regional Build Committee.
Which around a decade ago was replaced by the LDC committee.
A centralized version of the former.
With the latter the Borg assumes control of everything and $$$,, with the exception of only a few thousand dollars in the local congregations accounts to cover a few minor repairs.
This new arrangement all major repairs or whatever have to be approved by headquarters.
With this new arrangement the Borg can assume control over ALL of its properties anytime.
Hope this helps. Someone please correct me if I'm not 100%. But I do believe its along these lines.
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dropoffyourkeylee
The WT Relief work as I understand it is this.
A disaster strikes for which the resident has insurance, be it a hurricane, wildfire, large hailstorm, or whatever.
In such cases, local contractors are overwhelmed, so it is not unusual for contractors (JW or non-JW) to move in temporarily for the work. There is usually a demand surge on materials as well, resulting in delays. JW's take in mostly donated materials, donating their time and expertise for the rebuilding/reconstruction work. They feel like they are doing good for the brotherhood and get that happified feeling. The JW homeowner is just happy to get the work done and get back into their home. Then when the homeowner JW gets the insurance check, they turn it over to the WT.
I don't think what they are doing is illegal or fraudulent, though it seems kind of underhanded to me.
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TonusOH
Thanks for the info, Beth Sarim.
They probably didn't do anything illegal, but it would be a bad look if they were prioritizing wealthy families in order to maximize the money they made from using free labor. If the only claims are from anonymous Reddit posts, there's not much to go on.
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enoughisenough
JW website has article which I paraphrased on my FB: ( copied/pasted my comment ) On official JW site, there is a topic : do Jehovah's Witnesses Assist with disaster relief? The short article tells about how they get organized . Local branch office learns about it and rank and file from other areas donate time ( free labor ) and resources. to help out. Under subtitle Funding,it tells us donations sent to the branch offices pay for it....work is done by unpaid volunteers so the donations can go directly for relief efforts. You can look that up for yourselves. I would copy /paste the article but I don't want copy right issues. Now The official article that I have mentioned doesn't tell you anything about how they collect the homeowners insurances--no, they say the relief comes from donations and volunteers- There was a time you could send the JW a donation marked for disaster relief, but they told the rank and file to stop that and just donate to the world wide work.
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road to nowhere
Dropoff....
Key word; expertise
Donate to world wide work and we will use it however we damned well please.
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DesirousOfChange
The official article that I have mentioned doesn't tell you anything about how they collect the homeowners insurances--no, they say the relief comes from donations and volunteers-
Yes, those who receive the assistance are asked to "donate" payments from their insurance company. Note that no one is asked to pay their deductible and they will assist those who did not have insurance. WT has organized relief in 3rd world countries for other community buildings, ie, schools, firehouses, etc (personally know of this in Jamaica). They figure this benefits their "image" in the eyes of local authorities.
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enoughisenough
On the thought that some think it "fraud"...Is it disclosed to the homeower upfront that they are expected to fork over their insurance benefit? If a group of volunteers came to my house to repair something, would I think I should pay them as they are volunteering out of " Christian" love? A group of church men came and repaired my Mom's porch for FREE! Some churches do this for elderly ones. After flooding, we went and worked at "friend's" homes for free-did they send an insurance ck to the JW-I don't know. Isn't it a sort of fraud to ask people to go to work as free volunteers for days and weeks without telling them: "you are going to work for free, but we are collecting a big check " Do the elders know in advance the JW are collecting checks? I have heard annoucements made asking for skilled help to go and rebuild, but I never heard , your free labor will brings 1000's into the JW coffers. Here is another thought I just had: a few years back, after a big storm, the annoucement was if you had an RV you could let a now homeless JW live in that you could make it avalable to them. Does anyone know if insurance cks were collected for what insurances allocate for housing ? Just a thought back to the noted article: I find it misleading to the public when they say donated funds are used to help with disasters, when actually they make money on the disaster. During the Lahaina disaster, other churches had relief set up for people...I didn't see any JW doing that work in any clips I watched.