A new online portal to provide trustees with tailored guidance will launch by the end of December 2017, the Charity Commission has said.
David Holdsworth, chief operating officer at the Charity Commission was giving an update on the progress of the regulator’s digital services at the public meeting in Cardiff yesterday.
He said the Commission had heard that some people had found it hard to find what they were looking for since its website was integrated with the main government website.
The new charity services portal is intended to be a “one stop shop” that will make it easier for charities to “self serve” and track progress on any applications to the Commission, “a bit like Parcelforce”.
It will also ensure that “guidance and content is tailored” depending on the type and size of charity.
Another digital service being tested at the moment is one which will make it possible to change a charity’s name in 24 hours, where currently it takes an average of 33 days.
He encouraged charities to engage with the Commission about what they found helpful and how it could improve its services.
Online registration has halved time
He also said that since the Commission started registering charities online just over a year ago the average time it takes has dropped from 90 days to 45 days.
Holdsworth said this was because the regulator is having to go back to people less often as they are “getting the data in right time”.
“This gives us better value for money,” he said. “We are redeploying resource elsewhere”.
From Governance & Leadership magazine
Annual return
The new online version of the annual return is due to go live on 31 August but that users will notice the difference in 2018 when they will be asked to confirm some information is still accurate, rather than be required to re-enter information.
“I know some charities see annual return as a burden,” Holdsworth said. “I would challenge that conception.”
He said the register of charities is the second most viewed part of the government’s website, after HMRC, with “one million hits per month”.
Holdsworth said charities should view their page on the register as “free marketing tool”.
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