A man got a huge shock when he found he had received £2,700 in donations for his charity trek – in just one night.


Richard Herring, of Thames Ditton, set up an online donation page for the trek to Machu Picchu, Peru, that he will complete for charity, Sense, next year, but had no idea that sharing a name with the famous comedian would ever be so bounteous.


The comedian of his namesake saw the page and tweeted to his 97,000 followers: “This isn’t me, but wouldn’t it be cool if you pretended it was and all sponsored him anyway? Go on.”


Within minutes, 370 generous strangers had donated, taking Richard just £300 shy of his £3,000 target.


Mr Herring, a finance manager, said: “I’ve been overwhelmed by the generosity of the other Richard and his followers – I’ve had my fair share of jokes about living a double-life as a famous stand-up comedian but never imagined sharing a name would help my fundraising in this way."


Sense is a national charity that provides support and services to deafblind people in the UK.


For more information on Sense, visit sense.org.uk.


To donate, visit justgiving.com/teams/Machu-Picchu-Trek.