Desktop Banner

Mobile Banner

Have you had a ‘spring clean’ of your charity reserves recently?

We often see charities with numerous restricted and designated funds that do not move year-on-year, simply being brought forward one year and carried forward to the next. Due to the age of these funds, many people at the charity, including management and trustees, do not fully understand the purpose of these historic balances.

Undertaking a review of historical records (financial, correspondence and any available minutes) should enable management and trustees to establish a clear picture of the original purposes of such funds being held.

A spring clean of the charity’s funds held provides a tidy starting position to articulate your reserves policy.

Designated funds

It is always worthwhile to review the charity’s current designated funds at least annually to assess whether the purpose is still valid.

Funds may have been designated in previous years for a specific project, such as IT transformation or a beneficiary-specific project to further the charity’s objectives. Are these projects now complete, or did plans change with the project not going ahead, or was the designation forgotten and not used?

Trustees can approve these funds to be undesignated and transferred back to general unrestricted funds. The decision should be minuted in the year in which the decision relates, ie not retrospectively.

Restricted funds

Consider these two common scenarios relating to restricted funds:

1. Numerous funds have arisen over the years from donations towards specific capital projects. The donation ‘sits’ in a restricted fund, not moving for years after the project is completed or is gradually reduced over the life of the asset to match the depreciation. This is achieved via a transfer each year to general funds and can be time-consuming without giving a clearer picture of the charity’s position.

Actions for arising donations:

2. Funds left over from specific projects or appeals and balances remain unused year after year in restricted funds.

Actions for funds left over:

The year-end financial statements will need to include disclosures around the rationale for each transfer.

This article is part of our Charity trustee insights hub. It has some great insight pieces for charity trustees to consider on key topics right across the charity sector, including governance, reserves, digital transformation and finance function, to name a few.

If you would like to discuss the importance of reserves for your charity, please contact Nick Sladden, Zoe Longstaff-Tyrrell or your usual RSM contact.

authors:nick-sladden,authors:zoe-longstaff-tyrrell