[2] Listeners are invited to respond by sending cheques using a Freepost address, or can make payments online or by telephone.
Listeners can also set up a standing order payment to support all 52 charities each year.
[5] Each year since 1927, the BBC has broadcast a special Christmas Appeal in association with St Martin-in-the-Fields church in Trafalgar Square, London.
Amounts raised for other charities in that year ranged from £1,366.00 (Jenni Murray appealing for BEAT (Eating Disorders Association) on 24 Feb 2008) to £53,988.00 (Krishnan Guru-Murthy appealing for Homeless International on 3 March 2007, one week later).
[7] An earlier programme based on the same principle was The Week's Good Cause, which ran from 1926 (from 1939 in the BBC Home Service) until controller James Boyle's major reforms to Radio 4 in 1998, and was the longest running BBC radio series.