We believe that the public expects the Charity Commission, as regulator of charities, to know where there is a serious risk of significant harm to or abuse of a charity, its assets, beneficiaries or reputation. The issues we consider serious and will therefore want to know about are:
- significant financial loss to a charity
- serious harm to beneficiaries and, in particular, vulnerable beneficiaries
- misuse of a charity for terrorist purposes (including charity links with or support for terrorism, financial or otherwise, connections to proscribed organisations, misuse of a charity to foster criminal extremism)
- serious criminality and/or illegal activity within or involving a charity (including fraud and money laundering)
- charities set up for an illegal or improper purpose
- charities deliberately being used for significant private advantage
- where a charity's independence is seriously called into question
- other significant non-compliance, breaches of trust or abuse that otherwise impact significantly on public trust and confidence in the charity and charities generally
Our publication Complaints about charities (CC47) explains when we will, and when we will not, take up the issues reported to us. You can find more information on:
Our Risk Framework explains our regulatory approach in more detail, including how we assess risk. It is the tool we use to determine when and how we will react to individual cases of concern. To address matters of significant concern we will intervene to protect the charity and in the most serious cases of abuse, we may open a statutory inquiry.
However, many of the complaints we receive are not for us and should be raised directly with the charity or with other bodies. Before contacting us you should check whether or not the issue is one in which we can be involved