Sharing my very best secret to a low-stress holiday season!
I've given CanadaHelps charity gift cards (via an attractive email or option to print) to family and friends the last few years and I can't recommend more highly. It is simple as can be, people love receiving them and it is very cool to see what charities people pick (recipients are prompted to send an email to you when they spend the card). You choose the denomination and delivery date if sent by email.
All this plus you get the tax receipt (instant email) which discounts the gift by ~40%! (exact depends on which prov/terr you live in, assumes you're over $200 in charitable giving for the year). A great way to bump your charitable giving at the end of the tax year.
https://www.canadahelps.org/en/giftcards/orders/CanadaHelps is a great organization - 100% of the gift card goes to the organization your recipient chooses. You can elect to donate a couple bucks to CanadaHelps at check-out time if you wish.
I've received so much positive feedback with these gift cards - several people have told me they now send these gift cards as well. The only small pain is if you give to someone who doesn't spend the card - CH sends you an email after several months to let you know. A couple times I've had to send reminders to very busy friends though for the most part people have redeemed pretty quickly (it is truly quite delightful to receive the notice emails in late Dec and Jan). If you have a probable non-responder on your list and you know what charity would interest them, you could of course just donate directly as a gift also using CH.
