Posted by James Pearson on 17 Dec 2012

Changes to Charity Gift Aid Repayments

HMRC is modernising the system for charity gift aid repayments from April 2013. The new system will be called Charities Online and will be based on the electronic submission of claims. This is the process through which charities claim payments from HMRC in relation to donations made through the gift aid scheme and does not change anything for those making donations.

At the moment claims need to be made on the R68(i) Gift Aid Repayment claim form, but from April 2013 two electronic options will be available. The first option will be a free electronic claim form that will be available through the HMRC website. This form will allow claims relating to up to 1,000 donors to be made per return, although there will be no limit to the number of returns that can be made. Alternatively, if this route would be to time-consuming, external software providers will be able to develop software that is compatible with HMRC’s systems and allow claims relating to up to 500,000 gift aid donors to be made per day. It is possible that external software providers may charge extra for the provision of this service.

Regardless of the option that is chosen charities will need to continue to collect the standard donor information, such as first name or initial, last name, house name or number and postcode. This information will need to be submitted on a spreadsheet attached to the online claim. A template showing the form the spreadsheet should take will be available on the HMRC website from April.

Charities Online will also introduce new online forms to replace the current ChA1 Charities Application Form, ChV1 Charities Variation Form and CASC(A1) Registration Form.

HMRC accept that some charities will not have access to the internet and will introduce a paper form ChR1 that will enable claims to be made by post.

Additional information will be made available by HMRC in January, but it appears that these changes if implemented correctly, should speed up the Gift Aid repayment process which is to be encouraged. As with all changes though it is likely that there will be teething problems and if you are unsure of what these changes mean or how you can adapt to them, contact us for advice.

Contact Tax Innovations

If you would like any advice regarding the above article or would simply like to discuss other ways in which we could help you or your business, please contact us on 01962 856 990 or customerservice@taxinnovations.com.

Share With