Charities have reported difficulty in filling ballot places for next month's Great Manchester Run following the organisers' decision to expand the field after charities had bought their places.

At the time of the prospectus being given to charities, Nova – the race organisers – had limited the race to 34,000. After charities had bought their places, Nova decided to expand the field by a further 2,000 and also to release the final 10,000 tickets in a ballot after the first entries were sold.

Civil Society has learned that a number of both national and smaller charities are now experiencing difficulties in finding runners for all of their fundraising places, as runners have been able to secure non-fundraising places more easily this year. Less than a month before the race, a number of organisations who asked to remain anonymous told Civil Society they still had places to fill.

Eric Wilkins, project director of the Great Manchester Run at Nova, said that the decision to expand the field was in response to demand from previous years.

"The feedback from charities has generally been positive, although we do acknowledge that moving to a partial ballot is a significant step in the development of the Great Manchester Run and will take a period of time… for potential participants to become familiar with the process," he said.

Helen Dodd, vice chair of the Events Managers’ Forum, told Civil Society that the group will be surveying members' feelings on the run to take to Nova in a meeting scheduled for the next few months. She said that while the meeting will focus on the planning of Nova's suite of fundraising events in 2011, it will also address the issues related to the Great Manchester Run.