Most small charities have one person who builds the Gift Aid claim and one person who can send it. On many boards those are different people. The second person is often the chair, who holds the Government Gateway login because they set up the charity's Charities Online account years ago. The treasurer prepares the figures in the evenings, the chair presses send, and the other trustees see a total in the annual report, if they see anything at all.
That arrangement works until a figure is wrong, a declaration is missing, or the treasurer moves on. Then the board finds out that nobody else looked at the claim before it left.
This piece covers who should look at a claim before it is sent, what they should see, and how to record that they did. It assumes a three-trustee board, which is common for a small charity: a chair, a treasurer and one other trustee. Larger boards can follow the same pattern with more names.
Who needs to see a claim before it goes in
Three people, each with a different job.
The treasurer builds the claim. They pull the eligible donations from the cash book, check that declarations are on file, and work out the figure. They are the one who knows where any gap in the records sits.
The chair sends it. Because the Government Gateway login is theirs, they are answerable for what goes to HMRC under that identity. A chair who has never seen the figures is signing blind.
The third trustee is the check. They do not need to rebuild the claim. They need to read the summary, ask whether the total looks plausible against what the board knows about giving in that period, and confirm the declarations are where the summary says they are. It is a short job, and it is the one most boards skip.
This is general information, not tax advice. The rules on who can make a claim and what a charity must keep are set out in HMRC guidance. Check current Charities Online guidance for your charity's position.
What a one-page claim summary should show
Ask the treasurer for a single page before anything is sent. It does not need to be elaborate. Four things should be on it:
- The period covered, with start and end dates.
- The total of eligible donations in that period, from UK taxpayers with valid declarations.
- The Gift Aid due at 25p in the pound on those donations.
- The declarations behind the figure: how many there are and where they are held, such as a folder or a scanned file reference.
The 25p rate is basic-rate relief as it stands at the time of writing. Rates and rules can change, so check current HMRC guidance before relying on it.
The summary should also say which donations are being treated as eligible. Membership subscriptions do not automatically qualify for Gift Aid. A trustee who sees a subscription total in the claim should ask whether it meets the membership-benefit rules, and the answer should be on the page.
If the summary cannot tell a trustee where the declarations are, the board has not seen the evidence. The page should point to it.
A worked example
Take a charity that has £2,000 of eligible donations from UK taxpayers in a period, each with a valid declaration on file. At 25p in the pound, the Gift Aid is £500.
That is arithmetic, not a forecast. Another charity with different donations, or with gaps in its declarations, will get a different figure. For trustees, the useful point is that the £500 can be traced. There are £2,000 of donations, each backed by a declaration, and the figure is that total multiplied by 0.25. If a trustee can follow that line on the summary, they can ask sensible questions about it.
Recording the sign-off in the minutes
A nod at the end of a meeting is not a record. Put the approval in the minutes. One line is enough: the claim for the stated period was presented, the summary was reviewed by named trustees, and the chair was authorised to submit it. Add the date.
This matters for the next treasurer. When the role changes hands, the incoming person should be able to see who approved which claim and when, without asking the outgoing one to remember. It also helps if a claim is questioned later.
How this works on Vasker Plus
Vasker's Plus plan (£119 a year) includes Gift Aid claim tooling. The treasurer builds the claim inside Vasker, and validation runs on the figures before anything is sent. Validation does not replace the checks above. The summary still needs a trustee who reads it.
When it is time to send, the treasurer or chair sends the claim with the organisation's own Government Gateway login. Vasker does not store the Government Gateway password. The sender ID and password are typed only at submission and then discarded. Every account uses two-factor authentication.
Vasker is listed by HMRC as commercial software for filing Gift Aid and charity repayment claims online through Charities Online. HMRC does not endorse or approve any software supplier.
Keeping the records
HMRC expects Gift Aid records to be kept for at least six years. Keep the request and response records from each claim, along with the declarations behind it, and check current HMRC guidance for anything else that applies to your charity. Store the minutes with them. A board that can show the claim, the evidence and the approval together is in a far better position than one that has to reconstruct them later.
Before the next claim
For a board still deciding who should prepare the claim, a rough estimate is a sensible first step. The free Gift Aid gap calculator at https://vasker.co.uk/gift-aid-gap-calculator/ needs no account. It gives a planning estimate, not a claim, and it does not replace the declarations. Estimate your Gift Aid gap before the next trustees' meeting, so the board can see roughly what is at stake.
This article is general information for UK volunteer treasurers, not legal, tax or accounting advice. Check current HMRC Charities Online and Gift Aid guidance, and the Charity Commission, OSCR or CCNI guidance for your organisation.