Posted by Paul Flint on April 20, 2001 at 13:40:05 from 194.238.50.23:
In Reply to: Re: Is TARS a Charity? posted by Alex Peal on April 20, 2001 at 13:02:25:
I have no doubt that the matter of charitable status will be revisited in due course by the trustees not least because, as Peter Hyland points out, this subject has been referred to in the report to trustees by the Development Committee.
In practice, the accounting provisions of the Charity Commission are not particularly onerous, relative the whole process of producing annual accounts, which has to be done in any event. In the case of TARS this would require modification to the layout of its published accounts - which would be well within the capabilities of an accountant. I am responsible for the accounts for a business registered as a company limited by guarantee (ie as is TARS) and as a charity. The benefits of charitable status are significant in this instance (eg relief from corporation tax, exemption from capital gains tax on gains accruing to the charity and applied for charitable purposes, a reduction of 80% in rates, some exemptions from VAT, and certain tax incentives to individuals and busiensses to make donations). The significance of each of these varies according to the type of charity, and so, for eample, rate relief may be extremely beneficial to charities which own property, but not to those that do not (eg TARS). The degree of administration required of the charity by the Charity Commission is geared also, to some extent, by the size of the charity in terms of its income. When the matter of charitable status is reviewed the relevance and degree of benefit of each "fiscal priviledge" will have to be considered, and weighed against the degree of administration required to achieve it.