The new Fundraising Regulator aims to be operational in four weeks’ time, its head of policy said earlier this week. 

Gerald Oppenheim, head of policy at the Fundraising Regulator, was speaking at an Association of Chairs event about fundraising and governance, where he said he expects the organisation launch “in four weeks’ time”. 

This means the regulator will take over from the Fundraising Standards Board as the body that receives complaints, it will also look to proactively investigate issues.

He also expects that the Code of Fundraising Practice will be transferred from the Institute of Fundraising by the time it launches and that the new regulator will get the rule books on street and door-to-door fundraising from the Public Fundraising Association. 

He said that the press clearly still “looking for stories about fundraising costs” and that he was expecting more stories to come out around the time of the regulator’s launch.

Working closely with the Charity Commission

Oppenheim described the Charity Commission’s revised fundraising guidance as “extremely important” and said his organisation would be “working very closely with the Charity Commission”. 

He said issues with fundraising “often expose other governance concerns” and that a memorandum of understanding would be in place between the two regulators. 

He added that when investigating charities about their fundraising “we will look closely at trustees – just to understand how something has happened”.  

Describing the situation where lawyers often challenged FRSB rulings as “desperately unhelpful” he said his organisation intended to be “an engaged regulator” and issue guidance “to support good, better and best practice”. 

Oppeheim said that those charities which have to pay the levy, and the amount that they have to pay, will be decided using the information in their annual returns filed with the Commission.

EU data protection rules

Oppenheim also urged charities to get comply with European Union General Data Protection Regulation, which will come into force in 2018 and requires charities to have unambiguous consent before contacting anyone. He said even if the UK votes to leave the EU that the government could still enforce the move as it is grounded in “consumer protection”. 

An NCVO working group is due to publish guidance later this year.