Possibly because you’re not really free. You’re just not charging them.
With charity organizations, there’s a cost to working with volunteers. At the very least, it takes time. But it also could take infrastructure, supplies, additional staff, etc. And so while from your point of view, you’re offering free labor, from theirs, either the actual costs or opportunity costs may be too high - especially if the volunteer work you offered is not what they’re actively seeking in their current development cycle.
Or they could be pro money-laundering.
I have “donated” money on Kiva - a few have defaulted, but for the most part, I’ve been paid back and re-loaned the money. If there is interest, you don’t get it back. I’ve also loaned to microplace.com, which is a similar idea - but you do get paid interest.
I’ve loaned 8 times and have never been defaulted on.
It this interests you, they are giving away free $25 loans right now, with funds underwritten by an anonymous donor. You can use my URL below – or any member of Kiva can get one via their account. FYI, I get nothing from it.
Kiva and other micro loan providers do not seem to make much difference in development for an area but they can provide a useful service. They work as a savings account in reverse. In many poor areas there is a cultural norm that any money that can be saved be given away to a neighbor in need. Since many really poor areas have so many people in need it becomes impossible to save any money to improve one’s life or start a business. By giving the money up front and having the people save money to pay back the loan it then is possible for the people to invest because there is no cultural norm against paying loans back.
I’m a microfinance critic, but I do like Kiva. It’s a great user experience for the donor, and that goes a long way.
These organizations are run like businesses, and they probably trust work on that level to their professional staff. After all, what happens if they entrust high-level anti-money laundering projects to you, and then you disappear into the ether with all of your knowledge and expertise, leaving that department crippled? Volunteers don’t have a lot of ties to the organization, so they are going to be problematic in positions where it makes a huge difference if they get flaky.
I imagine any volunteers they use are in interchangeable support level positions. Any higher volunteer programs are probably more structured internships, and these are quite competitive and a large time commitment.