The application window for the Transition Fund is too short and the conditions too difficult to satisfy, New Philanthropy Capital has said.

Writing in the organisation’s blog, head of charity analysis Iona Joy (pictured) said she was disappointed to see that the deadline was 21 January 2011 as the original press release had talked about it being available over the “next 13 months”.

She said: “Under any scenario, a 7½ week application window is tight, let alone the fact that it runs over a busy family holiday period.

“Few charities will be able to meet this deadline, as they have only the haziest notion of which local statutory funders are going to cut them and how badly.”

She added: “If the fund is available for 13 months since November 2010, what is the timetable until December 2011?

“Funding decisions will apparently take until March for most, some for May, with all disbursements made by July 2011.

“Surely decisions could have been phased over a longer period?”

On the entry conditions, she said they require charities to have either evidence or “substantial reason to believe” that they will face a funding cut of at least 30 per cent.

According to Joy, most will be in the second category and “may struggle to compute the >30 per cent figure”.

Not helpful

Similar concerns were expressed at the CFDG London Members' Meeting yesterday.

Pesh Framjee, head of not-for-profit at Crowe Clarke Whitehill, referred to the short application window, saying it “isn’t particularly helpful, the approach to how this has been set up and managed”.

This then prompted a finance director in the audience to highlight the “logic trap” that was presented by the requirement to demonstrate a 30 per cent funding drop.

He said he himself did not yet know how his charity’s funding is going to be affected and didn't wish to send out a negative message to funders by speculating.

The Cabinet Office did not respond to questions.