One of the most important areas of fundraising for us is the charity's own lottery game.  We  have a team of door to door canvassers who work in the local community encouraging people to join our lottery.  We understand that many people are wary of door to door canvassing and will want to check that the person calling is genuine.  Photographs of as many as possible of our current canvassers will be published here.  We will keep this page updated with any changes of staff  as soon as we are able to - however please do get in touch with us if someone calls at your door claiming to be working for the East Anglian Air Ambulance and gives you cause to be suspicious.

Our canvassers do not operate door to door cash collections.  If someone calls claiming to be from our charity and asking for cash they are extremely unlikely to be authorised by us to do so.  We have had some previous incidents of this happening so would urge supporters to be vigilent and do check with us if you are unsure.

Pictured here are some of our current lottery canvassers: Richard Millar; Dave Scrutton; Mick Friar; Paul Grimston; and Nigel Askew, but recent joiners may not pictured, however they will be happy to show identification or wait while you check with our head office.

An organisation claiming to represent the ‘Air Ambulance Service’ have targeted local residents in a campaign which is taking much needed funds away from a genuine life-saving charity, according to an investigation by Trading Standards.

The East Anglian Air Ambulance and Suffolk Trading Standards have been made aware of a number of leaflets being circulated around the county and possibly elsewhere by organisations representing themselves as the ‘Air Ambulance Service’.

The leaflets claim that unwanted items are urgently needed in order for them to ‘financially assist to cover or reduce the cost of ground air ambulance medical transportation for patients caught in difficult medical circumstances’.

Nigel Howlett, Senior Fair Trading Officer for Suffolk Trading Standards, said: “We’ve had a number of concerned residents from across the county call us to say they’ve had these leaflets through their door and are worried that someone is trying to make money off the back of a well respected charity.

“The leaflets are very confusing as people picking them up may automatically think they are donating to the East Anglian Air Ambulance.  They are not.  In fact, in the small print it says they are not associated to any local helicopter emergency medical service, but very few people are likely to read this information.

“The key sign for the public that this is a scam is that the website they publicise on the leaflet does not work.  If anyone wishes to donate their items to a charity which has put a leaflet through their door then we would always advise that you do a little research on where your items will be going before leaving them outside your front door.”

Steve Whitby, Deputy Chief Executive of East Anglian Air Ambulance, said: “We have two charity shops across the region that sell items donated to us and they are tremendously well served by the people of Suffolk who make sure we have a good supply of good quality items to sell.

“It’s a real shame to hear that fraudulent organisations are trying to cash in on people’s generosity and leave a charity without the funds it needs to continue saving lives around the East of England.

“The East Anglian Air Ambulance operates a number of fundraising initiatives across the four counties we cover and I’d just like to remind people that anything from us would be clearly branded.  We do work with a company called ‘World UK Limited’ who are authorised to collect clothing donations on our behalf but this is the only organisation we work with.  If people are in any doubt about where their donation is going they should give us a call to clarify that the donation they wish to make will come directly to us."

The Children’s Air Ambulance is in no way connected to the East Anglian Air Ambulance Charity.

The Children’s Air Ambulance (Registered Charity Number 1111780) was registered in October 2005.

Accounts were filed for the period ended 31st August 2006. These accounts showed income of c. £47000 with costs of c.£49000. The main cost to the charity was Consultant’s fees of £42000.

According to the Charity Commission website, as at December 11^th 2009 this charity has yet to file its statutory Annual Returns for the years to August 2007 or August 2008 – both of which are considerably overdue. Accounts for these years have belatedly been presented to the Charity Commission but are not yet available for viewing.

According to our supporters at least one canvasser has intimated that the Children’s Air Ambulance already operate a helicopter – we are unaware that they have access to, or have ever used funds to operate, a helicopter.

This same canvasser also claimed that the East Anglian Air Ambulance is unable to fly outside of its regional boundaries in order to transfer patients to other hospitals. This is incorrect – we have done so in the past and will continue to do so when there is a clinical benefit in doing so.

The canvasser in question also gave the example of transporting a patient from Scotland to London as a benefit supplied by the Children’s Air Ambulance. In reality such a journey would be more likely by fixed wing aircraft than by helicopter. When challenged on this point the canvasser claimed that their aircraft had a top speed of 300 miles per hour – no civilian helicopter can reach such a speed (the top cruising speed of our helicopters is around 155 m.p.h.).

We obviously accept that people are free to donate to any Charity they wish. We do, however, wish to distance the East Anglian Air Ambulance from any of the dealings of the Children’s Air Ambulance.