SCVO defends OSCR after 'inaccurate' Herald story

Governance | Niki May Young | 29 Sep 2010

A Herald Scotland story which claimed that 8,000 Scottish charities could not afford charitable status due to accountancy costs has been labelled “inaccurate” by the Scottish Council for Voluntary Organisations in defence of the Office of the Scottish Charity Regulator.

Yesterday’s story headlined £400 fee is forcing charities to give up status claimed that small charities in particular were unable to afford a typical £400 accountancy fee to submit accounts to OSCR. However Paul White, director of networks at the SCVO, was keen to advise that small charities in fact need to do no such thing.

“The claim that small charities are forced to spend £400 to submit accounts to OSCR is simply not accurate,” he said. “It’s true that larger organisations are required to submit audited accounts but the majority of charities need not. Nearly two-thirds turn over less than £25,000 a year. So long as they are not incorporated, all that’s required of them is a simple receipts and payments account.”

The Herald pointed to 8,000 charities removed from the Scottish register when it commenced regulation in 2006. A spokesman for OSCR, said that this was due to thousands of inherited charities which had already ceased operations. The regulator undertook a “big body of work” to remove these charities from the register in the first two years, he said.

Some 952 charities were removed from the register in the past year but the OSCR spokesman was keen to emphasise that this was due to a number of reasons other than charities defaulting, including those voluntarily removing themselves from the register.

Asked whether OSCR does enough to advise charities in default, the spokesman pointed to a sequence of reminders over a period of six months after the deadline to submit accounts has passed. Once these reminders have passed with no action the charity will be listed on the website as defaulting. There are currently 471 Scottish charities defaulting on the OSCR register.

White added: “The turnover of old and new charities remains healthy and consistent since OSCR’s inception in 2006.”

Directory: Office of the Scottish Charity Regulator (OSCR)

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