How charity data is sourced, checked and published

Data sources

• The Charity Commission full register download: daily public extracts for charities, annual return history, classifications, areas of operation and trustees.
• Official nonprofit programme pages, help articles and authorised marketplaces from software providers, used for the benefit guides.
• Official GOV.UK, HMRC, DBS and Charity Commission guidance, cited on the guides and checkers that rely on it.

Which charities are covered

The current import covers registered charities in England and Wales selected by latest reported income, together with a small number of well-known organisations that pass the same filters. It is a research sample rather than the full register, so income positions, percentiles and rankings on this site describe that sample only, not every UK charity.

Charities outside the sample can still be checked on the official register.

How profile figures are calculated

• Income and expenditure: the latest figures reported in the register extract, with the financial period they relate to.
• Income trend: the change between the earliest and latest periods in the imported annual return history.
• Filing timing: annual return receipt dates compared with each financial period end. The ten-month filing rule is used as planning context only, not as a finding of non-compliance.
• Peer context: a charity's income position and percentile within the imported sample. Similar charities share at least one classification or operating area and are listed by closest latest income.
• Related charities: links found through shared trustee names, shared classifications or shared operating areas in imported records. They are research prompts, not evidence of affiliation, control, conflict or wrongdoing.
• Source completeness score: a 100-point measure of how much source data a profile has, covering recent accounts, filing history depth, classifications, operating areas, trustees and related records. It measures data coverage, not charity quality.

When a charity profile is published

A profile is published once its imported record is complete enough to be useful: recent accounts, several years of annual returns, classification and operating-area records, a trustee list and related-charity signals. Each published profile also carries a reviewed summary prepared from that charity's structured source data.

Summaries must pass automated checks before they appear: they have to reference the charity's actual source values, avoid unsupported reputational wording such as "safe", "scam" or "best", and they are withdrawn if the underlying register data changes. New profiles are released gradually so each one can be checked.

Benefit page admission rules

• Every nonprofit benefit page must link a current official provider, official help, or clearly authorised marketplace source.
• Pages must preserve material caveats such as country limits, budget caps, plan scope, application review, admin fees, usage limits, discontinued programmes, and unsupported discount claims.
• Provider pages that return 404, 403, bot-protection placeholders, personal scheduling pages, or client-rendered shells without verifiable offer text are rejected or kept out of the published benefit library.
• Status trackers are allowed only when they help users avoid a false claim, for example when a provider has an official general page but no verified charity-specific discount.

Update schedule

• The Charity Commission source is checked every day. When a new extract is available it is imported in stages, and the previous verified data stays live if a download or validation step fails.
• Nonprofit benefit sources are monitored automatically and rechecked by hand at least every 90 days.
• Current refresh dates and record counts are shown on the sources page.

Limitations

• Register data can lag behind a charity's latest filed accounts, trustee changes or regulatory action.
• Financial figures are as reported to the regulator and are not adjusted for inflation, restricted funds or group structures.
• Nothing on this site is a rating, recommendation, fraud check or impact assessment. Verify important decisions against the official register and filed accounts.