The Charity Commission has reversed a decision to reject an application to register a consumer helpline for timeshare owners as a charity.

The Commission initially received an application for charitable status from the Tatoc Timeshare Association, which says it is “run by timeshare owners for timeshare owners”.

The application was formally rejected following a decision by the Commission that it was “not exclusively charitable”.  But the Commission said at the time that the organisation’s helpline had the “potential to be charitable”.

The organisation put in a second application which covered only the helpline, having set up a separate organisation to run the helpline, known as Tatoc Consumer Helpline.

This was initially rejected, but was accepted following a review.

In a statement released today, the regulator said: “Following additional subsequent information provided by the applicant and amendments to the organisation’s objects, we have concluded that the helpline is entitled to be registered on the register of charities.”

In today’s statement, the Commission said of its initial decision: “We acknowledged that some of the purposes did have the potential to be charitable [but] we formally rejected the helpline’s application.

“The helpline’s objects were amended and the applicant sought a review of our decision to not register the helpline in view of the amended objects and some additional information provided.”

Following a review of the Tatoc helpline’s amended objectives, the Commission accepted that the new charity falls in line with “the descriptions of purposes in section 3(1) of the Charities Act 2011 and for the public benefit”.

On the Charity Commission’s website, the Tatoc Consumer Helpline claims to operate for the “advancement of education for the public benefit on their legal rights as consumers and on ways to avoid being mis-sold timeshare or fraudulent products/services by providing information, advice and by raising awareness.”

It also claims to work for “the prevention and relief of financial distress and hardship for those owning timeshare”.

The Commission said today that following its conclusion that the helpline is “for exclusively charitable purposes… it is therefore entitled to be registered on the register of charities under section 29 of the Charities Act 2011.”

The new charity was formally registered on October 17 and appears on the register of charities.