A Sheffield-based sports charity and a Barnsley-based urban regeneration charity have both been investigated by the Charity Commission for filing late and inadequate financial accounts and returns.

The Beighton Welface Recreation Ground claimed it failed to submit two years’ worth of accounts and four years’ worth of annual returns, after a number of its trustees resigned and those left “lacked understanding” of the organisation’s accounting system.

And the Barnsley Deane Community Partnership claimed that a volunteer financial officer hadn’t been given a password to access the financial information and didn’t understand the software being used. 

The Beighton Welfare Recreation Ground

The charity, which lists its objectives as the provision of a social welfare centre for the benefit of the local inhabitants (as well as those connected to the local mining community), failed to submit accounts for the years ending 31 March 2009 and 2010. It also failed to submit annual returns required for the financial years ending 31 March, between 2009 and 2012.

The charity was informed by the Commission that it would become part of a statutory inquiry if it remained in default via letter on 20 September 2013. After no documents were received, the charity officially became involved in the inquiry on 23 September 2013.  

On October 1, a representative of the charity submitted accounts for the years ending March 31 2009 and 2010. These were found by a Commission accountant to be “inadequate to such an extent that the charity could not be said to have complied with its legal requirements”. The Commission resolved to “more closely” scrutinise the accounts already submitted by the charity for 31 March 2011 and 2012. Those accounts too were found to be inadequate.

The charity submitted revised accounts on 24 August and on 19 September to the Commission which were again found to be inadequate. It was not until 10 December 2014 that the charity was able to submit adequate accounts and returns for the year’s ending March 31 2009 to 2013 and the year ending December 10, 2014.

A representative of the charity told the Commission that the delays had been due to all but two of the organisation’s trustees and the charity’s secretary resigning in 2010 after a bar that was run on the organisation’s premises went into receivership and the receivers “took a lot of the charity accounts and paper work”.  

According to the report, the trustees who did remain “lacked understanding of the accounting system,” and applied to the Coal Industry Social Welfare Organisation – the charity’s umbrella body – for help. None was provided by the CISWO as the Beigton charity “owed them money”. It wasn’t until 2013 that the charity appointed an accountant to help bring its accounts into order.

As a result of the inquiry, five sets of accounts were filed and over £281,000 of charitable income is “now transparently and publicly accounted for on the register.”

Beighton Welfare Recreation Ground is now listed as “up-to-date” on the charity register, with an income of £46,900 at the year ending December 10 2014.

The charity was contacted for a comment but none has been provided.

Barnsley Deane Community Inquiry

The Commission have also published a report into its inquiry into the Barnsley Deane Community. The charity was also being investigated for submitting its accounts late.

On three occasions between 25 April and 15 September 2014 the charity submitted inadequate accounts for the outstanding years. The charity’s trustees informed the commission on April 25 that their reason for not complying with their legal obligations was that the charity had “lost funding, and therefore its paid staff”.

Trustees also explained that, at the time of the loss of funding, a finance officer who volunteered to finalise the charity’s accounts had no “understanding of the Quick Books system” used by the charity. Nor did he know the password for the computer.

The financial information was adequately provided to the Commission on 13 November 2014. As a result of the inquiry £195,000 of charitable income has been made transparent to the public.

The charity is now listed as being “up-to-date” on the charity register, although its latest accounts submitted for 31 March 2013 show it had an income of £0.