Gift Aid & GASDS

Gift Aid is an HMRC scheme, where charities are able to claim back 25p every time a qualifying individual donates £1 to them.

In order to claim this, charities will usually need to be registered with the Charity Commission for England and Wales, however, churches within the Church of England, do not necessarily need to register, but are often considered "Excepted Charities". 

Gift Aid can be claimed on donations to your church from an individual when the donor fits certain criteria (detailed in the next question). As it is a donation there are special rules if the donor receives any benefit from their donation, such as a gift. Unless you are specially registered with a charity shop, you are not able to claim Gift Aid on the sale of items donated to the charity. You are not able to claim Gift Aid on items that are bought to be sold. 

Some donations given through a third party, such as through PGS, CAF and Stewardship, have already had the Gift Aid applied by the third party, so you are not able to claim Gift Aid on these.

You need to claim on donations within 4 years of the end of the financial period you received it in.

To find out more about some of the special rules about claiming Gift Aid, click here. 

In order for a donor to be eligible for Gift Aid, the donor must have:

- paid at least as much in Income Tax or Capital Gains Tax in that tax year as you want to claim in Gift Aid.

- made a Gift Aid declaration that gives you permission to claim it. 

The Gift Aid declaration must include the name of the charity and charity number (if relevant), a declaration agreed to by the donor stating that they have paid enough in Income or Capital Gains Tax for Gift Aid to be claimed (this can be done through a tick box), the donor's full name and their home address. 

Signatures are no longer required on Gift Aid declarations, though some form of assent to the declaration is needed. 

Declarations can also be made electronically (such as through an email) or orally (such as over the 'phone). If a declaration is being made over the 'phone, in order to keep the declaration, we suggest that the details are filled in on a paper form and that it is noted on the page that the details were taken over the 'phone, giving the name of the recorder and the date. 

Examples of Gift Aid declarations can be found here.

You must keep a record of Gift Aid declarations for at least 6 years after the most recent donation you claimed through Gift Aid. This can either be keeping the original declaration (if paper), or scanning them and keeping them electronically. 

In either case, you must ensure that this is done securely and in compliance with data protection. 

If a donor asks for a receipt for their donation you should provide this. This may be to better manage their own finances, or if they are a 40% taxpayer, there are additional benefits they can claim through donating to charity. 

However, even if a receipt is not asked for it is good practice to write to all your regular donors annually to thank them for their gift, which could include a receipt as well. For some more ideas on how to do this, please visit the Trust section of our Enabling Giving webpage.

You may be able to claim 25% on:

• cash donations of £30 or less
• contactless card donations of £30 or less collected on or after 6 April 2019

This is called the Gift Aid Small Donations Scheme (GASDS) and you do not need a Gift Aid declaration from the donor to claim. From 6th April 2016, you can claim on up to £8,000 of donation (so receive up to £2,000 in a tax year).

Your GASDS claim cannot be more than 10 times your Gift Aid claim. For example, you can claim on £1,000 worth of donations through GASDS if you’ve received £100 of Gift Aid donations in the same tax year.

You need to record the:

• total cash donations collected
• date of the collection
• date it was paid into a bank account

You’ll need to keep records of any contactless card donations that you’ve taken, for example, receipts from your card machine.

For more information click here.

There are a number of programs available for claiming Gift Aid and depending on the number of donors you have you may wish to look into these. However, if you have a small number of donations you can claim Gift Aid by sending HMRC a spreadsheet of your donations.

Do consider the Parish Giving Scheme for your regular givers, which will claim the Gift Aid on your behalf. 

For more information, including HMRC's donation spreadsheet, click here.

Another helpful guide from the Association of Taxation Technicians can be found here.