Form

How to complete form ChA1 HMRC Charities Application Form

Published 29 April 2014

This form was withdrawn on 3 June 2015

This publication was archived on 3 June 2015. Register your charity’s details for tax purposes using HMRC’s online service.

This publication was archived on 3 June 2015. Register your charity’s details for tax purposes using HMRC’s online service.

1. Introduction

This guide will help you complete the HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) Charities Application Form (ChA1). You may find it easier to print this guide so that you can refer to it as you complete the form ChA1.

The HMRC Charities Application Form (ChA1) is for use by charities that wish to make claims for repayment of UK Income Tax, including Gift Aid, or where HMRC asks the organisation to demonstrate it is eligible to claim the charity tax reliefs and exemptions available in the UK. Please don’t complete this form unless you want to register for the Gift Aid scheme or HMRC has asked you to complete it. HMRC will use this form to determine whether your organisation satisfies the definition of a charity for UK tax purposes

It is essential that the information you provide is complete and correct. If not, HMRC may ask you to send in a new form.

HMRC may publish the name and address details of organisations that it has agreed satisfy the definition of a charity for UK tax purposes.

2. Before you start - qualifying conditions

Before you start completing the form you will need to consider whether your organisation is likely to qualify as a charity for tax purposes. To qualify an organisation must:

• be established for charitable purposes only
• meet the jurisdiction condition
• meet the registration condition
• meet the management condition

These conditions are explained below.

3. Established for charitable purposes only

To meet this condition your organisation must be able to show it meets the definition of a charity under the law of English and Wales. To do this the organisation must be established for charitable purposes only. This means that the governing document (the document that sets up your organisation) must restrict its purposes to those that are wholly charitable under the law of England and Wales and it must provide a public benefit. If you are unsure whether your organisation’s activities are charitable under the law of England and Wales, more information is available on the Charity Commission website by following the link below.

Charities already registered with the Charity Commission for England and Wales will meet this condition automatically. Certain other bodies in England and Wales may also qualify but will need to show that they meet the definition.

Organisations outside England and Wales will need to show they meet the definition. In effect they need to show that, if they were based in England or Wales, they would be recognised by the Charity Commission as a charity under the law of England and Wales.

Charities and Public Benefit section on the Charity Commission website

4. The jurisdiction condition

To meet this condition your organisation must be based in the UK, another country in the European Union, or in Iceland or Norway.

5. The registration condition

To meet this condition your organisation must be registered with a regulator that fulfils the same or similar functions to the Charity Commission in England and Wales if the law in the country where your organisation is based requires this.

If you are required to register your organisation with a regulator in your home country you must do so before you complete this form. If you are not sure whether you need to register you should contact the regulator to find out.

The main regulator for England and Wales is the Charity Commission for England and Wales, for Scotland it is the Office of the Scottish Charity Regulator.

6. The management condition

To meet this condition your organisation must be run by people who will ensure that the funds and tax reliefs the organisation benefits from are used for solely charitable purposes.

You need to tell HMRC who is authorised to act on behalf of your organisation in relation to tax, and what they are permitted to do.

There are two roles which you must allocate to people within the organisation: ‘authorised official’ and ‘responsible persons’.

6.1 The Authorised Official

This is the person within your organisation who you tell HMRC is authorised to deal with your tax affairs and, where necessary, submit tax returns. This is the only person within your organisation who is authorised to submit repayment claims. HMRC will contact this person if they have any questions about your organisation. You may, however, appoint two authorised officials if you wish just in case one is available when HMRC needs to contact them.

6.2 The responsible persons

This should be a person with legal responsibility for running your organisation and includes:

• trustees
• directors (where your organisation is a company)
• other persons in controlling positions in your organisation such as the Treasurer, Company Secretary and Financial Controller

You need to nominate between two and four responsible persons.

A responsible person may also be the authorised official but if they are you need to nominate at least two other responsible persons so there is a minimum of one authorised official and two responsible persons. The person who completes this ChA1 form (the ‘applicant’) must be one of the responsible persons or the authorised official.

All authorised officials and responsible persons are ‘managers’ of your organisation and must be ‘fit and proper persons’ in order for the organisation to be eligible for charity tax reliefs. Before completing this form those managers should read the HMRC fit and proper person guidance. The guidance includes a suggested model declaration for the managers of the organisation to confirm they are a fit and proper person. There is no requirement to use this model declaration but, if HMRC asks you, you must be able to show that you have carried out suitable checks to demonstrate the person is fit and proper.

Read detailed guidance on the fit and proper persons test

6.3 Allocating roles to people outside your organisation

Your organisation may also choose to appoint people outside the organisation to act on its behalf. There is no requirement to do so but if you wish to you can appoint:

6.4 A nominee

This is an individual or an organisation, outside your organisation, who you authorise to submit Gift Aid or other tax repayment claims on your behalf. They might just make the claims for your organisation or they might make the claim and receive the repayment for your organisation. A nominee can also act as an agent.

6.5 A collection agency

This is a nominee that submits large numbers of Gift Aid repayment claims to HMRC and that has been recognised by HMRC as a collection agency. If you use a collection agency you need to show the details of this on the application form in the same way as for a nominee except that you do not need to provide bank details for the collection agency as these are already known to HMRC.

6.6 An agent

This is an individual or organisation outside your organisation, such as an accountant or lawyer, with whom you authorise HMRC to exchange information about your organisation’s tax affairs. Agents may submit repayment claim forms and tax returns on behalf of the organisation. They might also be a nominee for it. If you are an agent acting on behalf of the organisation you need to provide authority for this using Form 64-8.

Go to form 64-8 Authorising your agent

7. Notes to help you complete the form

Form ChA1 is designed to be downloaded, saved on your computer and filled in on screen. This guide provides help with some of the sections on the form.

Please complete this form in English or in Welsh if you are using the Welsh version of the form. If any documents you send in with the form are not in English or Welsh, please provide a translation of these documents.

8. Section 1 - the organisation

In this section you should give the details of the organisation that wishes to claim the tax repayments or charity exemptions.

You need to provide details of both the official address for the charity and the correspondence address if this is different. For charities that are companies the official address is its registered office address. For charities that are not companies there might be a charity office or other charity premises address. However, you may want any correspondence to be sent to a different address, such as the address from which the charity actually operates or the home address of the authorised official. For many charities the two addresses will be the same.

You are asked to provide an email address if your organisation has one. HMRC will use this to send you occasional details about changes to procedures or new guidance. If you don’t have an e-mail address for your organisation please put ‘None’ in the box.

You are also asked to state whether your organisation is registered with a charity regulator. If you are required by law to register with a charity regulator in your home country you must do this before completing this form and enter the details in box 7. If there is a charity regulator in your home country but you are not required to register with it, you must give the reasons in box 8.

This information will be used to help determine whether the jurisdiction and registration conditions are satisfied.

This section asks for the HMRC issued Unique Taxpayer Reference (UTR), the Company Registration Number (CRN) and the VAT registration number. Not all organisations will have these but if your organisation does they should be entered here.

9. Section 2 - brief details of the person making the application

In this section you should give details about yourself and about your relationship with the organisation. You must be the authorised official or a responsible person, or both. This section must be completed by someone within the organisation, and must not be completed by an agent.

10. Section 3 - governing document

This is the document that sets up your organisation. The form and wording of your organisation’s governing document are very important and, if you are not registered as a charity with the Charity Commission for England and Wales, it will help HMRC decide whether your organisation meets the condition that it has been established for charitable purposes only. In order to meet this condition the organisation must also benefit the public and this is covered in Section 5.

It is essential that you send in a copy of your current governing document, unless your organisation is a local branch set up under a national constitution, and HMRC has already agreed that organisations set up under that national constitution meet the definition of a charity for tax purposes. If your organisation has used a form of governing document approved by such a national organisation, parent body or principal regulator, they will inform you of this and you do not need to send a copy of the constitution; however you should show in section 3 that you have used such a form of the governing document. You need to provide confirmation from the national organisation, parent body or principal regulator that your organisation is an approved branch set up under their constitution and again they will provide that confirmation in a format they have agreed with HMRC.

11. Section 4 - operation and funds

Use this section to tell HMRC where the organisation carries out, or will carry out, its activities and how those activities are, or will be, funded.

If your organisation has been established for some time and has prepared accounts you should send a copy of the most recent accounts. A newly set up organisation should provide an estimate of its first year’s gross income in box 21. ‘Gross income’ is all income that the organisation receives before the deduction of any expenses or tax and it includes grants, donations, trading receipts and interest.

HMRC also needs to see copies of bank statements for the last 3 months.

Many charity regulators require bodies with income above a certain level to register with them. In England and Wales a threshold of £5,000 applies, unless an organisation is an exempted or excepted charity under the 1993 Charities Act. This is explained on the Charity Commission website. If your income exceeds the threshold specified by your national regulator you should register with them before completing this form.

In box 26, you need to state if your organisation will be operating in a different country from that in which it has been established. There is some helpful information on working internationally available on the Charity Commission website.

Charity Commission website

12. Section 5 - what your organisation does

This section asks you to explain what your organisation does and where necessary set out what public benefit your organisation will be providing.

If you have already registered your charity with the Charity Commission in England and Wales you will have already explained your activities and public benefit to them. You can simply repeat what you told the Charity Commission in section C of their form CC5a here. If you are already registered with the Charity Commission HMRC will not reconsider whether or not you provide a public benefit; however, the information you provide in this section about what your organisation does is used to ensure you receive the right level of support from HMRC.

For charities that the Charity Commission for England and Wales has not registered, HMRC will use the information you provide in this section to establish whether or not your organisation provides a public benefit.

If you have already registered your charity with the Office of the Scottish Charity Regulator (OSCR) you can simply repeat here what you said in boxes 8, 9 and 13 of their form.

12.1 Charity objects and public benefit

The things you do are usually shown as objects in your governing document. For example, a UK organisation which provides support for homeless people might have as an object to relieve poverty among homeless people, with its governing document providing for this to be done by supplying hostel accommodation and food for vulnerable people. The public benefit would be to the homeless people as they would have somewhere to sleep and food to eat. This would relieve their poverty and give them a chance to make a fresh start. There would also be indirect benefits to society as a whole by improving the social aspects of people sleeping rough.

You also need to say if there are any restrictions on accessing the benefits you provide. For example, where charges are made for the hostel accommodation mentioned above, you should say what they are and why these do not impose restrictions on accessing benefits. Are these available to the public or just to those who can afford them? Other restrictions might be geographical, for example you only offer support to people in a particular town. Where the benefits are restricted to a section of the public you need to provide details.

There is more information and guidance on charity objectives and public benefit available from the Charity Commission website

12.2 Evidence of charitable activities

If your organisation has already drawn up a plan of activity similar to a business plan or has other documentation, please enclose this to explain what the organisation does. If nothing is available you should give a more detailed statement of what you do in box 28. This will help to reduce the time it takes HMRC to process your application.

If you only carry out activities agreed by a national association or parent organisation, for example Scout and Guide groups in the UK, you need to state that this is what you do and provide the name of the national association or parent organisation.

13. Section 6 - security information

You should use this section to give details of the authorised official and between two and four responsible persons. You must have an authorised official and can appoint two if you wish so just in case one is not available when HMRC needs to contact them . The person who makes the application (that is the person named in section 2) must also be included in this section as either the authorised official or a responsible person (or both).

Please put the details of the authorised official on the first security information sheet, and details of 2 responsible persons on later pages that you create, by clicking on the ‘Add another person’ button at the end of section 6. For each person included in section 6 please ensure you confirm in box 29 both their position within the organisation, and whether they are an ‘Authorised Official’ or ‘Responsible Person’.

If a person named in this section has a National Insurance number, you must enter this on the form. If this person does not have a National Insurance number, you must send documents with the form to verify the identity of the individual. One of these must be a copy of the page of a passport with a photograph of the person, or other similar photo identification, and the other must be a document to verify that person’s address such as a utility bill.

Each of the named people should sign the form in the box provided. Before they do this, they should read the fit and proper persons guidance by following the link below.

If the charity is managed by a corporate trustee, for example a Trust Company or a Trust Corporation, you should enter the name of the corporate trustee showing the position as ‘corporate trustee.’ Enter the address of the corporate trustee in the box headed ‘private or home address.’ Do not complete the date of birth or national insurance number boxes. There is no need to send identity documents for a corporate trustee.

If the details of the authorised official given here change in the future you must notify HMRC on the Charities Variations Form (ChV1) before making any further claims on form R68(i). A claim sent in with amended details will not be processed until HMRC has been properly notified of the change on form ChV1. You should also inform them on form ChV1 if any of the responsible persons change.

Read detailed guidance on the fit and proper persons test

14. Section 7 - nominee and collection agency information

Use this section to tell HMRC about any nominees or collection agencies your organisation decides to appoint. You do not have to appoint a nominee or collection agency but, if you do, you should put the name of the nominee or collection agency in box 37. If you name an organisation, you should enter the name of an individual in that organisation who is authorised to submit repayment claims in the box below. A nominee organisation or collection agency needs to provide the names of people within the organisation who are authorised to deal with HMRC and these people need to sign in the box at the end of section 7.

If a person named in this section has a National Insurance number, you must enter this on the form. If this person does not have a National Insurance number, you must send documents with the form to verify the identity of the individual. One of these must be a copy of the page of a passport with a photograph of the person, or other similar photo identification, and the other must be a document to verify that person’s address such as a utility bill.

A nominee is an individual or an organisation, outside your organisation, who you authorise to submit Gift Aid or other tax repayment claims on your behalf. A collection agency is a nominee that submits large numbers of Gift Aid repayment claims and that has been recognised by HMRC as a collection agency. If you are using a collection agency you need to show the details of this on the form in the same way as for a nominee except that you do not need to provide bank account details for the collection agency as these are already known to HMRC. You should enter the collection agency reference in box 39 and you can then leave boxes 47 to 53 blank. The collection agency will provide you with their reference if HMRC has given them one. The reference will be in the format [CAC xxxxx].

If you want HMRC to exchange other information with your nominee about your organisation’s tax affairs, so that your nominee is acting as an agent, you will need to provide additional authority for this by completing Form 64-8 ‘Authorising your agent’ and submitting it to HMRC. Without it, HMRC cannot discuss other tax issues with your nominee.

When completing the form click on the ‘Add another nominee’ button below to enter the details of another nominee. Each of the named people should sign the form in the box provided.

Go to form 64-8 Authorising your agent

15. Section 8 - your organisation’s bank details

You should complete this section even if a nominee or collection agency will be acting for your organisation and you have provided details for the nominee or collection agency.

You should use this section to provide details of the organisation’s bank account into which you want HMRC to pay Gift Aid repayments and any other tax repayments. Unless you have asked for repayments to be made to a nominee or collection agency, HMRC will make repayments to your organisation into this bank account using the Bacs system so you need to ensure that your bank can accept such payments. If you are unsure whether or not your bank can accept Bacs payments please check with your bank.

When entering the date on which the account was opened, please enter an approximate date if the account has been in existence for a long time and you are not sure when it was opened.

If the bank details given here change in the future you must notify HMRC on the Charities Variations Form (ChV1) before making any further claims on form R68(i). A claim sent in with amended details will not be processed until HMRC has been properly notified of the change on form ChV1.

16. Section 9 - declaration

This section must be signed by the person named in section 2 whose details should also appear in section 6 as the authorised official or a responsible person within the organisation. They are declaring that the information on the form is correct and complete. If the person named in section 2 is a corporate trustee then the person authorised to sign on behalf of that company must sign the declaration.

17. Checklist - documents you need to send with the form

There is a checklist at the end of the form for you to tick to show what documents you have enclosed. You must ensure that you send all the necessary documents with the form. HMRC may ask you to submit a new form if the one you send is not correct or complete. If any of the documents you send are not in English please also supply a translation; if you don’t it will take HMRC much longer to process your application.

The checklist also has boxes for you to tick to show that the form has been signed in each of the sections that requires a signature. Before you submit the form you should make sure that each of the people named on the form has signed the appropriate page.

18. Where to send your completed form

Once you’ve completed your form, please check it carefully as any missing information may mean HMRC has to ask you to send in a new form.

When you have finished completing the form, print it out, sign and date it. For security reasons the responsible persons named in section 6 and the nominees named in section 7 need to sign the form at the end of those sections. Do not make any other handwritten amendments to the form.

Keep a copy of the form for your records, or in case there are any queries.

The completed form should be sent to the New Cases Team. Follow the link below to find the postal address to send your letter to HMRC.

HMRC Charities and CASC postal address