Facts & Figures

Annual income Range	Number of charities	%	Annual income £bn	%
£0 to 10,000	80,487	47.5	0.262	0.6
£10,001 to £100,000	48,184	28.4	1.668	3.6
£100,001 to £500,000	15,810	9.3	3.541	7.7
£500,001 to £5,000,000	7,410	4.4	11.021	23.9
£5,000,000 plus	1,525	0.9	29.668	64.3
Sub-Total	153,416	90.5	46.160	100.0
Not yet known	16,082	9.5	0.000	0.0
TOTAL	169,498	100.0	46.160	100.0

At the end of June there were 169,498 main charities on the Register with an aggregate income of £46.16 billion in total. The latest reported figure has been included for each charity.

Many charities are very small organisations, with an annual income of less than (the reporting threshold of) £10,000. They are required to keep accounts but do not have to routinely submit them to the Charity Commission.

Almost 90% of the resources in the sector are controlled by only 8,935 charities or 5.3% by number. These charities, each with annual income (gross income) of more than £500,000, have their accounts professionally audited and are also required to provide information from their accounts in their Annual Return. View the information submitted by an individual charity as part of their Register of Charities entry. Simply enter a charity’s name or its registered number.

The largest 722 charities, with an annual income of more than £10 million each, now attract 52% of the total income and this proportion is increasing over time. See recent history.

The charities shown as “not yet known” fall into two categories, 7,201 are newly registered, the remainder have reported no income since they were registered.

Aggregate income

We have used the figures reported in the latest accounts received for each registered charity; this is always a mixture of data from different reporting cycles depending on how recently a charity has reported to us. The data is therefore currently a mixture of AR07 and AR06 data in most cases. As the process moves on through the calendar year the proportion of AR07 data will at some point overtake the AR06 data held. In theory, eventually, 10 months after the last accounts for (December) 2007,on 31 October 2008, AR06 data should have been fully replaced by AR07 data. For a minority of charities, where there have been delays in reporting and processing, this data could still be showing as AR06 or even from an earlier Annual Return cycle.

Accounting treatments may not be consistent between charities, we have not attempted to correct for this.

We have been screening the initial data received from charities and where possible we have agreed corrections to data which have been duly authorised by charities. We cannot guarantee that all of the data is free from errors but we are working with charities to continually improve its accuracy.

At an aggregate level the estimate of the total figures for all registered charities inevitably includes an element of double counting of the resources involved. This is because resources are regularly transferred between charities for a variety of reasons:

• The same resource may go through several pairs of hands as a grant, or there may be inter-charity transactions where joint projects are undertaken.
• Charities may incorporate(become companies) and the consequent transfer of assets etc. from the unincorporated charity to the new company charity is shown respectively as expenditure and receipts in the accounts.
• One charity may invest funds on behalf of another. Please note that all known Common Investment Funds(CIFs) and Common Deposit Funds (CDFs) have been excluded from the data presented here to avoid double counting.

Definitions of Annual Income

The Charities Act 2006 recognised, for the first time, the (existence and) commercial importance of group accounts for charities. Group accounts reflect the combined activities of a charity and those entities that it controls and benefits from (usually non-charitable trading subsidiaries). “Charity only” accounts are still used where there is no group structure.

Previously charity only accounts had been paramount, although some larger charities have been preparing and submitting group accounts for some time.

As the Charities Act 2006 has been rolled out it has therefore become necessary to change the definition of Gross Income to accommodate the advent of group accounts.

From AR 2008 onwards (i.e. for accounts ending in the calendar year 2008), the definition of (Gross) annual income will, in the majority of cases*, be the Total Incoming Resource figure shown in the group (or charity only) accounts (within the Statement of Financial Activities statement (SoFA)).  See our publication CC63 - Independent Examination of Charity Accounts: Directions and Guidance Notes for details.

Previously the old definition of gross income (used for the results shown for 2007 and previous year ends – see recent history) was more complex and attempted to adjust the transactions of a charity to identify the income of the charity itself.

Our estimates suggest that at an aggregate level the overall effect of the change to the new definition of Gross income is an increase in the overall reported Income of the sector is of the order of 10%.

*(Only where newly endowed resources have been received will an adjustment be necessary to exclude them).

Facts And Figures

Register Summary – Recent History (1999 to 2007)

At 31st December	Total Number of charities	Annual income £bn	Number of Large charities (annual income > £10 million)	Annual Income £bn	Proportion of Total Income %
2007	169,297	44.55	679	22.41	50.3
2006	168,609	41.26	627	20.10	48.7
2005	167,466	37.86	570	17.59	46.5
2004	166,336	34.86	511	15.84	45.4
2003	164,781	31.62	460	14.19	44.9
2002	162,335	29.45	421	13.04	44.3
2001	160,778	26.71	372	11.42	42.7
2000	159,845	24.56	336	10.27	41.8
1999	163,355	23.74	307	10.19	42.9

The table above shows the increase in the size (both numerically and in income terms) of the registered charity sector in England and Wales over the last decade or so.

It also confirms that the number of large charities (over £10 million annual income) has more than doubled resulting in the proportion of the sector’s resources controlled by its largest organisations rising to more than half of the total.

Please note that £10 million has been used to define large charities here because data is available for that segment of the sector for the whole period.

Annual income Range	Number of charities	%	Annual income £bn	%
£0 to 10,000	80,971	47.8	0.261	0.6
£10,001 to £100,000	47,494	28.0	1.638	3.7
£100,001 to £500,000	15,749	9.3	3.533	7.9
£500,001 to £5,000,000	7,383	4.4	10.965	24.6
£5,000,000 plus	1,472	0.9	28.165	63.2
Sub-Total	153,069	90.4	44.562	100.0
Not yet known	16,252	9.6	0.000	0.0
TOTAL	169,321	100.0	44.562	100.0

At the end of March there were 169,321 main charities on the Register with an aggregate income of £44.56 billion in total. The latest reported figure has been included for each charity.

Many charities are very small organisations, with an annual income of less than (the reporting threshold of) £10,000. They are required to keep accounts but do not have to routinely submit them to the Charity Commission.

Almost 90% of the resources in the sector are controlled by only 8,855 charities or 5.3% by number. These charities, each with with annual income (Gross Income) of more than £500,000, have their accounts professionally audited and are also required to provide information from their accounts in the Annual Return. View the information submitted by an individual charity as part of their Register of Charities entry. Simply enter a charity’s name or its registered number.

The largest 681 charities, with an annual income of more than £10 million each, now attract 50.6% of the total income and this proportion is increasing over time. See recent history.

The charities shown as “not yet known” fall into two categories, 7,121 are newly registered the remainder have reported no income since they were registered.