Frequently Asked Questions for Member Organizations
Membership Sign-up and Renewal
Volunteer Ottawa membership is for charities, non-profits, and other organizations in the Ottawa region who work with volunteers. VO’s membership year runs from April 1 to March 31. Membership comes with a number of benefits — click here to read more about member benefits.
The most popular benefit is recruiting volunteers through Volunteer Ottawa’s online portal, the #1 most-searched volunteer site in Ottawa. Members can post an unlimited number of recruitment posts during their active membership.
Once you sign up, you are ready to post one or more Volunteer Opportunities (i.e. a recruitment post for a volunteer position). Potential volunteers read the posts and apply to the ones that interest them. You receive an email for every application, and a summary of applications is also saved in your account.
Because the needs of each organization are so diverse, once a potential volunteer applies for your position, your organization will be responsible for the next steps. Volunteer Ottawa asks that you reply to all applicants, including ones not selected for the next steps in the process. You can find free resources for the screening/interview stage on this page.
Membership with Volunteer Ottawa is intended for charities, non-profits, community groups, and associations who would like to recruit volunteers and access Volunteer Ottawa’s education and resources. Learn more about membership eligibility on this page.
If you are an individual looking for a volunteer position, please sign up for a free Volunteer account instead: https://volunteerottawa.ca/volunteer/
If you are an individual looking to support VO, gain voting rights at our AGM, and get an Education discount, please sign up for Individual membership instead: https://volunteerottawa.ca/individual-membership/
If you are not eligible for regular VO membership but will be holding an event in Ottawa that requires volunteers, please contact us about a 4-Month Event Pass instead: https://volunteerottawa.ca/organizations/event-pass/
Since most of our member organizations are charities and/or non-profits, it is common that our members don’t report a net profit. We use Annual Revenue as a proxy for organization size, since it is a common and accessible measurement for most.
If your organization has under $75,000 in annual revenue, then yes, you qualify for free membership!
If your organization reports over this amount in annual revenue, then you will be in one of the paid tiers.
Volunteer Ottawa is also a registered charity and membership fees help us maintain our operations and services to the community.
Click here to read more about our tiered membership fee structure.
We use your financial statement to confirm that your organization is in the correct membership tier.
The most common financial statements we receive are the audited financial statements organizations are required by law to produce each year. We accept statements produced in the past 1-3 years. We also accept the financial page from your most recent annual report.
We understand that newly-founded or very small organizations may not have this kind of statement. If you are unsure what to share as a financial statement, please contact us at [email protected] and we will find a solution.
Unfortunately we do not offer this service at this time. Membership runs on an annual basis and includes a number of benefits along with the ability to make posts to our portal.
Yes, of course! Being on a Board of Directors is a volunteer role and many organizations recruit through Volunteer Ottawa.
When making your Opportunity post, please select one or both of these filters to ensure your position shows up in filtered searches: “Type of Volunteering: Board Leadership”, and/or “Type of Volunteering: Governance (Boards, Committees)”.
Thank you for signing up! Your membership will be activated when payment is received and processed. With cheques, it may take time for them to reach us via mail. We will activate your membership once it is received and notify you that it is active.
Questions about your payment status? Contact us at [email protected]
Volunteer Ottawa’s membership system will not know if you are eligible for a higher or lower membership tier than the previous year. Please follow these steps to renew your existing account at a different tier:
- Login to your account first, to ensure that the new membership is applied to your existing account.
- Once logged in, go to the Become a Member page and click “Sign up” under the correct annual revenue category for this year.
- Complete the form and submit your payment. Your existing account is now renewed at a different tier from the previous year.
Yes! It’s fast and easy to renew your membership at the same tier as last year:
- Login to your account
- From your “My Account” page, go to Subscriptions
- You will see a list of previous subscriptions. Beside your most recent subscription will be a link that says “Renew”. Click the link and complete your information to renew.
Your Account & Using the Website
We may be able to help you recover your organization’s old account, including the data stored with it. Please email us at [email protected] for assistance.
Login to your account and go to My Member Profile. Upload your logo file — maximum size is 5 MB and the file format can be .JPG, .PNG, or .GIF. Once uploaded, your logo will appear automatically on your Volunteer Opportunity posts and on your Member Profile page.
The Volunteer Ottawa website currently uses a translation plugin to automatically convert our English pages into French. This is presently the best way for our organization to ensure that the website is available in French.
If you post an Opportunity in English only, the site will automatically create a French version as well. Users can switch the site language using the switcher in the top right corner.
We understand that you may have specific French text that you would like to include. In these cases, we recommend including both the English and French text in the form when posting your Opportunity. You are also welcome to post Opportunities in French only if the position is French-specific.
You can edit your Opportunities at any time. Login to your account and go to your My Opportunities page. Find the opportunity you want to edit in the list, then click “Edit Volunteer Job”. Make the edits required, then scroll to the bottom of the form and click “Update” to save your changes.
Yes! Follow these steps to re-activate an expired Opportunity:
- Login to your account and go to your My Opportunities page
- Find the expired Opportunity that you want to re-activate and click “Edit Volunteer Job” under that Opportunity
- Change the “Application Deadline” field to a date in the future
- At the bottom of the form, change the “Published Date” to today’s date to prompt the system to repost
- Click “Update” and the post will be re-activated
You can also edit any of the other information in the post at this stage.
Yes, you are welcome to seek volunteers who are members of specific communities or who have specific lived experiences. For example, a care group for stroke survivors might request that volunteers have personal experience with the effects of a stroke.
If your position has this kind of requirement, please include it as clearly as possible in the description of the Opportunity. If possible, we recommend also including it in the Opportunity Title.
Unfortunately we are not able to provide multiple logins to your organization’s account. Most of our members share access to their account with a common password. Our site does not require multi-factor authentication.
You can route the application emails for specific Opportunities to specific email addresses. A summary of all applications will always be saved in your Volunteer Report, but the full email application for each position will be sent to the email address entered in the “Contact Email” field when posting your Opportunity. You can enter different email addresses in different Opportunity posts to route applications to the correct team member.
Yes, your account and its data are saved even after your membership has expired. You can renew any time to regain access to your old Opportunity posts, list of applicants, and other account information.
Volunteer matches are made when an interested person reads your Volunteer Opportunity and submits an application. All applications are submitted intentionally by a real human being. No matching algorithms are currently in use on the Volunteer Ottawa portal.
Other Questions
Volunteer Ottawa uses the term “Volunteer Opportunity” to refer to a volunteer position posting on our portal. Each individual volunteer recruitment post is a Volunteer Opportunity.
No, Volunteer Ottawa is always free for volunteers. There is never a cost for volunteers accounts or for volunteers to apply to positions.
Unfortunately it is a member benefit for Volunteer Ottawa to share your calls for volunteers, and we therefore can’t offer this service to non-members.
Interested in membership? Our membership fees follow a graduated structure based on your organization’s size, and very small organizations can join for free. Click here to learn more.
Yes, we are happy to share advice on writing your Opportunity post. Here are our general tips for writing an effective Volunteer Opportunity:
- The “Volunteer Title” field will be the largest text on our Search page and on your Opportunity details page (the page you see when you click “Read More” on an Opportunity on the Search page). Therefore we recommend ensuring that your Volunteer Title is descriptive of the position and eye-catching.
- When writing your Opportunity, only the form fields marked with an asterisk (*) are required. However, we recommend filling in as much of the form as possible to provide potential volunteers with a clear picture.
- When describing the Volunteer Opportunity, focus on what the volunteer will be doing, the environment they will be working in, and who/how they will be helping.
- Several of the fields in the Opportunity form are designed to work with the filters available to potential volunteers on our Search page. Make sure you select all relevant options when writing your Opportunity so that it can be found by potential volunteers using our filters to search. The following fields affect how your Opportunity shows up with our filters:
- Types of Volunteering
- Language Preference
- Application Deadline
- Organization Category
- Volunteer Location
- Who the volunteer will help
- Commitment from Volunteer
- Appropriate for
- Volunteer Availability
- Volunteer Considerations
- “Application Deadline” controls whether your Opportunity is visible on the Search page or expired (visible only to you on your My Opportunities page). Your Opportunity will show on the Search page and be listed at the bottom of your Member Profile until the date chosen as the Application Deadline. After this date, it will no longer be visible on the public part of the site but can be re-activated if needed.
- “Contact Email” allows you to route the full application emails for different positions to different people in your organization. You can enter a different email address per Opportunity and that address will receive the full email application. A summary of all applications is always saved in your account’s Volunteer Report.
- We ask that you reply to all applicants, including the ones not selected to move ahead. The field “Time it will take to contact applicants” allows you to give applicants a rough estimate for when they should expect a reply.
Need more help designing your volunteer positions? Check out the free templates, tips, and guides available on our Resources page.
Boosting (sharing) your Volunteer Opportunities to our social media followers and newsletter subscribers is one of our free benefits for active members. At present, we are boosting Opportunities by member request, as space allows.
In order to be boosted, the Opportunity must be live on the Volunteer Ottawa portal. Contact us at [email protected] to discuss the best way to get your position more visibility.
Volunteer Ottawa also regularly boosts a selection of current Opportunities to our audience. If your Opportunity is live, it may be featured on our social media or in our newsletter. We aim to promote a broad range of volunteer opportunities in our monthly communications, featuring as many of our members as possible over time.
Posting events to our Community Calendar is a new benefit for active members! You can post any kind of event that your organization is holding, including AGMs, fundraising events, galas, and more. Volunteer Ottawa’s high search ranking means your event will gain more visibility online.
To post an event, login and go to Post an Event in your account.
We are making it easier than ever to access your benefits, coupons, and discounts as a member. Simply login and go to the My Benefits page in your account.
Since 2022, Volunteer Ottawa has offered our regular community workshops to active members at no cost. These workshops normally cost $145 per seat, but each member can reserve up to 2 free seats in any (and all) of our community workshops – as long as space is available. Your free seats can be given to staff or volunteers, including members of your Board of Directors.
There are two ways to access the education benefit:
- Login and go to the My Benefits page in your account. Copy the coupon code and use it when purchasing seats in workshops for a 100% discount.
- Email [email protected] from an email address associated with your organization and request your free seat in a specific workshop(s).
You can see upcoming workshops at the top of our Learn page.
Volunteer Expo is an in-person volunteer recruitment fair run twice yearly by Volunteer Ottawa. The Volunteer Ottawa team organizes, manages, and promotes these events and provides exhibitor space to our members for free.
Registration for an upcoming Volunteer Expo will open a month or two before the event itself and will be announced on social media and in our monthly VO Newsletter. Available space will depend on the event venue and is offered to VO member organizations on a first-come first-served basis.
Keep an eye on our Volunteer Expo for Exhibitors page for up-to-date information about upcoming Volunteer Expo events. You will be able to register through this page during periods when registration for an upcoming event is open.
The best way to stay up-to-date with Volunteer Ottawa’s news, events, and resources is to sign up for our free monthly newsletter for charities and non-profits. Anyone can sign up to the newsletter for free to receive news and updates. You can unsubscribe any time via the unsubscribe link at the bottom of every email.
Volunteer Ottawa has a number of other educational options and resources:
- For specific education and training needs, consider a custom workshop from Volunteer Ottawa. Custom workshops are offered on a fee-for-service basis and can be adjusted to fit a variety of budgets and education needs. Contact us at [email protected] to discuss options.
- Do you need training for your Board of Directors? Our self-paced online Community & Board Leadership Training course is now available in English or French! The course contains 2 modules with 30 lessons each and costs $145 per seat. Discounts are available for purchases of 10 or more seats — contact us at [email protected]
- No budget for training? You can also check out our Resources page for a variety of free resources carefully selected by the Volunteer Ottawa team for quality and relevancy.
Do you have a question not covered here?
Contact us at [email protected]