The Institute of Fundraising expects to find out in the next two months whether it can make a formal application for chartered status, its chief executive said last week.

Peter Lewis, chief executive of the IoF, was speaking at last week’s IoF Technology Conference, and said he expected to hear from the Privy Council about whether it “will entertain a formal application” for chartered status in “six to eight weeks”.

“If they give us the nod, we will come back to our membership to consider everything,” he said.

If the IoF became a chartered institute it would receive a royal charter and would have to cede some control over its affairs to the government via the Privy Council. The IoF is hopeful, however, that chartered status would give its members significantly greater professional standing.

The IoF first indicated that it was looking to obtain charted status in 2012.

Lewis said that obtaining charted status would “help us meet our strategic objectives of professional development” and that it would “put fundraising on a par with lawyers and accountants”.

There are already more than 900 professional chartered bodies.