For trustees, CEOs and founders doing three jobs at once
Practical guidance for the people running small UK charities - trustees carrying legal duties alongside a day job, CEOs holding a service together with a team of two, and founders working out what they've taken on.
Every article is checked against the regulators rather than against what other people have written, and it's pitched at the scale you actually work at. Nothing here replaces advice on your own situation. It should tell you what the rules say, what they mean at your size, and what to do next.
Conversion turns your charitable company into a charitable incorporated organisation without creating a new charity. No assets change hands, and the charity is not wound up. It keeps its charity number, its name and usually its bank accounts. You apply…
A reserves policy sets out how much of your charity’s freely available money you hold back rather than spend, and why. There is no standard figure, and no correct number of months’ running costs to aim for. The amount is…
Scroll through the social media of ten small charities, and a pattern appears. Clean graphics. A donation ask. A stock photograph with a quote laid over it. Everything looks competent, and almost none of it sounds like anyone in particular.…
Plenty of charities believe that having a charity website means the digital side is handled. In 2026, that belief quietly costs them. A weak or poorly planned online presence does more than look unprofessional. It chips away at trust, narrows…
What records a charity must keep, what good minutes capture, and how long to hold them Every charity has to keep proper records of its money, its decisions, and the people who run it. Some of it is a legal…
The registration catch, what you need to apply, the checks banks run, and how long it takes Opening a charity bank account is mostly a matter of having the right documents ready and passing the bank’s checks, but there is…
The account types, the banks, the fees, and how to choose the right setup A charity bank account holds and moves a charity’s money in the charity’s own name, rather than an individual’s. Every charity needs one; to keep its…
The legal document that creates your charity and sets the rules it runs by A charity’s governing document is the legal document that creates the charity and sets out how it is run; its rulebook. It states the charity’s purposes,…
The legal test at the heart of being a charity – and what “showing” it really means Public benefit is the legal test at the heart of being a charity: every one of a charity’s purposes has to be for…
CIO, charitable company, trust or association – and how to decide between them Your charity’s structure is its legal form – the thing your governing document creates – and it decides three practical things: whether your charity can hold property…