Charity Abseils and Abseil Events
We run charity abseils and other abseil events for charities, corporate and other groups in the UK and Europe. For all your abseiling needs – look no further.
An Abseil is a nerve testing challenge which people often use to raise money for charity. Organising an abseil for charity is a great way to raise some money as anyone can take part, it is also a great way of marketing your company to the local media. We will run the whole day for you – allowing everyone else to have a fun day – while perhaps getting you over a lifetime fear!
In the world of climbing, abseiling is a way of getting back down what you’ve just climbed up. You use a rope to lower yourself down and you control how fast or slow you descend, so it is a great personal challenge in complete safety.
Charity Abseil is a sister company of Dave Talbot Ltd check that out by clicking here.
Left is a video from one of our events.
With years of experience working with charities and big companies on events, you will get the best service delivered by the highest qualified and experienced instructors in the UK. We provide risk assessments, insurance, event photos and all equipment at no extra cost. Marquees, BBQs, changing rooms, catering and additional abseil lines can also be provided to meet your fundraising and event needs. We can run abseiling events with a single rope or multiple ropes depending on your event size and have been featured on the BBC and other TV channels.
Prices start at £750 for one rope with two instructors and 50 places available to abseil.
Charity Abseil put on yet another fantastic abseil for us at England’s highest waterfall – Canonteign Falls. Dave’s team were brilliant, and the event ran extremely smoothly from start to finish with 100% smiley abseiler faces coming back to me when they came to pick up their certificates afterwards. Every single member of the Charity Abseil team were very professional and put each one of our participants at ease, creating personal and memorable experiences for our very happy abseilers! Thank you Dave, and see you next year.
Marina - Events Organiser at Childrens Hospice South West
All safety equipment, risk assessments and insurance is included in the price, so you don’t have to worry. We will even take photos of the abseil event free of charge and give you them to use for marketing for your next charity event.
We will come to you!! It might be a bridge, a rock wall, a building, a church tower, or even a waterfall. If it goes down we can abseil it. With years of experience working at locations across the globe, we can offer advice before you book to make sure you have everything in the right place for your charity abseil.
Our instructors are the best in the business. It’s not about sending someone off a cliff edge, it’s about an unforgettable experience and helping people enjoy that. Smiles, coaching, laughter, photos and more is what comes as standard with every charity abseil event.
Just wanted to say a very big thanks to yourself, Dave and Marcus for a brilliant day yesterday! Great success! As a district of 12 stores allowing us to do the Abseil at Peel Tower we will of raised around £4,500 for comic relief!.
TK-Max
More Information on Running a Charity Abseil
If you’re a charity, or you are working within an organisation that is thinking of running an abseil event, here’s some useful information to help get you off the ground. If you need any further information on anything you have seen or would like to ask a question, then please contact us.
The Basics to Running a Charity Abseil
Firstly, many people and companies might offer the services of providing a charity abseil - but be careful. Some wouldn’t be insured or qualified, some might be using equipment from the 30 years ago. Others companies will only give you one member of staff to run the abseil event - making the task impossible to run the charity abseil event smoothly. Making the participants feel relaxed and confident is a big part of the job and if a company is understaffed on the day this will be very difficult.
With our abseils we always have a minimum of two qualified staff and use support staff from the charity or organisation to help organise people. Considering that for most people doing the abseil it will be the biggest challenge of their life, having plenty of staff to look after the participants is important.
Qualifications for Charity Abseils
Most people don’t realise that there are different qualifications in the climbing/abseiling world and that different instructors and companies will have different levels of qualifications. This means different levels of experience or insurance and also different ways of doing things. You name it, it will have an effect. Charity Abseil.org.uk has the highest level of qualifications in the industry for your peace of mind.
The SPA – (
single pitch award) is the basic starting qualification for being able to
run charity abseils outside and it’s the first on the ladder of outdoor climbing qualifications.
The highest level of qualification with running charity abseils in the UK, is the MIA (
Mountain Instructor Award). This allows you to do everything that an SPA can, but also allows you to perform complex rescues, should the situation arise. It’s peace of mind with these things. If you have an MIA running an abseil then you know that he or she has been assessed to a very high standard and comes with a huge amount of experience.
Next, you might want to consider someone with an IRATA (
Industrial Rope Access Trade Association) qualification, as a useful add-on to go with an SPA or MIA. Generally people who have an IRATA qualification aren’t used to working with large groups of people. The IRATA qualifications are used in an industrial setting but can also be useful if your
charity abseil is off a building and you might be using parts of the structure as anchor points. I always think that having both the MIA and IRATA qualifications gives you the most knowledge, experience and understanding of all situations – allowing you to run
the best charity abseil possible. The founder of www.charityabseil.org.uk – Dave Talbot has both these qualifications and will always be on hand to offer advice on your event.
There are other qualifications that are worth mentioning, the
CWA and the CWLA are both indoor climbing wall awards and are not really relevant to running an abseil but people with these qualifications could be used as an assistant for harness fitting or helping people off the bottom of the abseil. The MIC (
Mountain Instructor Certificate) and
Mountain Guide, are both qualifications that are for summer and winter environments, both of these qualifications are the equivalent to the MIA when dealing with abseiling events.
Running charity abseils isn’t just about setting up ropes – it’s so much more than that. Dealing with people is the most important thing. Making sure that everyone is looked after and given the same treatment as the person before them and the same again after 49 people have abseiled, 8 hours later.
You need to be professional but have a sense of humor and a smile. To have the ability to make everybody feel at ease and use judgement when to turn on the comedy and when to get the game face on is essential.
I’ve never had a person refuse to go down a charity abseil even though some of them have been brought to tears just from the thought of doing one. Eye contact, reassurance, a friendly smile and giving people options, I always find helps. Never rush anyone directly but you can be clever with how you manage the group. Talking to them, cussing out who has done what, giving a good demo and having equipment that inspires confidence goes a long way.
Most abseil companies try to get away with fewer staff, as this means more profit but the standards are going to drop and this could compromise safety. We always use a minimum of two staff when dealing with large abseil events.
On an charity abseil event that I ran last summer, I had five of my staff and three helpers from the charity, a total of eight in the team. There was one charity worker on the signing-in desk. They then sent the participant over to one of my staff who did the kitting up. From there they were taken over as a group to go through an abseil demo, a chance for participants to have a go on a slope rather than straight off the cliff edge.
A charity worker then walked them to the top of the abseil where I sent them off. A photographer was next to me to capture the action and I had a staff member half way down the abseil to encourage them and to take more photos. There was also one person at the bottom of the abseil as a friendly face to be greeted by and to sort kit.
This was a lot of staff, but the abseil was down the biggest waterfall in England!! and we still got 50 people down the abseil in time.
With running a charity abseil like this, it went swimmingly well. We stuck to our timings and got the numbers down. Everyone laughed and had a good time and a large sum of money was raised for the charity and people left having achieved something amazing. Most of the time having an extra pair of hands to solve problems, take photos and liaise with both participants and the charity staff will make the whole event go well for everyone involved.
Prices start at £750 for one rope with two instructors and 50 places available to abseil.
