How easyfundraising's six-person team supports millions with Zendesk AI

easyfundraising is the U.K.’s largest charity cashback platform allowing people to turn their online shopping habit into free donations for worthy causes. The idea is simple—shoppers choose their favourite charity or community group, and the retailer, not the shopper, donates a portion of the total sale.

This straightforward concept grew quickly. Since its launch in 2007, easyfundraising has raised over £65 million to help more than 180,000 good causes across the country. As the platform expanded, so did its audience. More shoppers meant more donations, more retailers—and more questions about how the whole process works.

People reached out with every sort of enquiry. They asked about support in getting started, missing donations, how to set up their account, and the status of their donations. And while the support team of just six agents takes pride in their work—the increase in ticket volume highlighted an opportunity to enhance how easyfundraising scaled. It became clear that they needed a solution that would help them maintain personal, high-quality service while growing sustainably.

That shift came when easyfundraising made the decision to adopt Zendesk AI. Today, roughly 70 per cent of incoming questions are handled entirely or partially by AI, giving the small team room to breathe and transforming how quickly they can support tens of thousands of shoppers and thousands of causes.

Manual workloads slow service

For years, easyfundraising worked from a single, catch-all inbox. Every ticket—from a simple “when is my next payment” question to complex donation investigations—arrived in the same place. Sorting and assigning each one took hours of manual effort.

“Our team was managing an increasing number of tickets,” Dominic Butterell, Customer Service Director at easyfundraising, confesses. “Sorting through questions about donations created a lot of back-and-forth with our customers. It really slowed us down—especially during busy shopping periods.”

When Zendesk AI became available, the team saw an immediate opportunity.

“We could instantly see how much better and smarter the experience could be,” Butterell says. “That was the moment we knew we needed to move.”


Intelligent triage brings order to rising complexity

With AI-powered intent detection, incoming messages are now categorised automatically. Donation questions flow into one path, general guidance requests into another and urgent matters rise to the top without manual intervention.

“Finally, we are able to see the inbox for what it really is,” Butterell explains. “Instead of a messy wall of text, we now have a structured flow of work, shaped by patterns the AI detects long before an agent clicks into a ticket.”

Response times have improved as well. Today, up to 85 per cent of customers who reach out through messaging receive a reply within one hour. Straightforward questions, like how to join a cause or when a donation might appear, are answered almost instantly by Zendesk’s AI agents.

“The shift was really noticeable during seasonal spikes,” Butterell adds. “With AI triage absorbing the initial load, our team stayed ahead, delivering consistent service without having to rush.”

And the team was able to do all of this without expanding headcount.

Agent productivity surges with a “quiet partner” in every conversation

Even with AI handling the initial wave of inquiries, many messages still require a human touch. Some involve complicated donation trails across multiple retailers, while others come from charity administrators seeking account support. These tickets require context, patience, and careful investigation.

“Before AI, agents often had endless exchanges with customers because they didn’t always provide enough information,” Butterell says. “With Zendesk’s AI tools, that changed the dynamic immediately.”

Now, when an agent opens a ticket, Zendesk’s AI Copilot tool surfaces relevant details—draft responses, help centre articles, and next-step recommendations. Instead of searching through documentation or rewriting explanations from scratch, agents receive high-quality starting points they can refine.

“It gives the team so much more context upfront,” Butterell explains. “By the time a ticket reaches us, the AI has already gathered the key details.”

As agents experienced the impact firsthand, confidence grew.

“Copilot has been a big help,” he says. “Some of our team didn’t realise how strong the suggested answers could be until they tried them. Now they can see the benefits—saving time while keeping the quality high.”

AI also eliminated delays caused by vague initial messages. If a customer submits only a few words, “missing donation,” for example—the AI agent asks clarifying questions automatically, ensuring agents get what they need from the start.

Building towards a smarter, more connected future

easyfundraising continues refining its knowledge base so Zendesk AI can answer even more questions with greater accuracy.

“We did a deep dive into our help centre and adapted a lot of articles to make them simpler and clearer,” Butterell says. “Because we’ve found that makes the AI responses even better.”

The team is also exploring proactive messaging and automated workflows to help supporters resolve issues, like missing donations, without needing an agent. Reducing friction in these moments strengthens trust and creates a smoother experience for shoppers and causes alike.

“AI is learning and improving along with our team,” Butterell says. “I’m confident Zendesk will continue to help easyfundraising serve its shoppers, retailers, and causes in a way that’s thoughtful, effective, and empathetic.”