Revenue Grants
Applications for Revenue grants of £10,000 or more per year for work taking place in the UK (including the Isle of Man and Channel Islands) can be made through our Main Grants Programme.
The amount requested must be at least £10,000 in each year. The maximum length of funding than can be requested is three years.
Revenue grants can be used to to fund core running costs, salaries and/or project costs.
Details of the types of grants we made across all our grant programmes can be found on the What We Fund page of our website. The activities or services that we will not fund are listed on the Not Normally Funded page.
We recommend that you download the Word or PDF version of the Guidelines at the bottom of this page and read them in full before starting your application.
Each of our grant programmes has separate guidelines. For information about applying for a Capital grant through the Main Grants Programme, a County Grant, or for any of our other grants, please refer to the guidelines for those programmes.
How to apply for a Revenue grant
Applications for Revenue grants can be submitted at any time, provided that
- you do not have an active grant from us;
- we are not already assessing an application from your organisation to one of our other programmes; and
- if you applied previously and were unsuccessful, that more than 12 months has passed since you received your declination letter.
There are no deadlines and we do not have an application form, but you must complete an Application Cover Sheet. This can be downloaded from the bottom of this page.
Mail shots or general requests for donations will not be considered.
The Application Cover Sheet must be completed and submitted with your application. This provides us with key information; your organisation name, full contact details, the name and email address of your main contact, and gives us an idea of the project or work you want us to fund and the amount you are requesting. It also asks for confirmation that your organisation has a Child Protection Policy (if applicable to your work) and that Disclosure Checks (PVG checks in Scotland) are carried out on all staff and volunteers working with children or vulnerable people.
Your application should be no longer than four sides of A4 and in font size no smaller than 11 point.
Begin your application with a half page summary. This should primarily focus on the project or work that you are asking us to fund, though you may also wish to include a sentence or two about your organisation. The summary is important as it may be used as the basis of information sent to Trustees during the assessment process.
Your application should clearly and concisely describe the work your organisation undertakes, your track record, what evidence you have that your work is effective, and provide details of the project or activities you are asking us to fund.
Please include all the following information:
Your Organisation
- Your organisation’s status (e.g. registered charity, company limited by guarantee, not for profit organisation or community interest company) and when it was formed.
- If you are a branch of, or related to, a larger organisation, please explain the nature of the relationship and whether it includes any financial support.
- The range of services or support your organisation provides, the needs/characteristics of the area in which you work, and the people who you help.
- How you monitor and evaluate your work, including evidence of how it benefits your service users/beneficiaries (i.e. the outcomes of your work).
Your Project (in this section 'project' refers to the work or costs you are asking us to fund, i.e. activities, services, salary costs or core costs)
- Details of your project.
- Why it is needed. If your project is based on the outcomes of a pilot, please provide details of the pilot, its outcomes, and tell us why the project should continue/develop.
- The number of people who will benefit.
- The aims of your project and what outcomes (practical results, changes and/or improvements) you hope to achieve. If you are requesting a grant to continue an existing project, it is important that you provide information about its impact to date.
Tip: common mistakes made by applicants are not including evidence or data to support the outcomes they tell us they achieve, or relying solely on case studies to illustrate impact.
- How the aims, progress and outcomes of your project will be monitored and evaluated (i.e. how you will know whether and to what degree it has been successful) and how, if appropriate, you will disseminate good practice to others.
- How the project will be managed and by whom. Include information about their experience and qualifications for the job.
- How you will ensure your project is cost-effective.
- How your project is currently funded, by whom, and when this funding ends.
- Your fundraising strategy for the project, including details of any funds already secured and applications you have made, or plan to make. We recommend that you make applications to other funders in addition to applying to us, even if you are requesting the full project costs from us. Please note we will expect you to have approached local and regional funders before applying to us. If it is not appropriate to do so in this instance, please tell us why.
- The names and addresses of two independent referees (people who do not currently benefit from your services or that will benefit from you gaining a grant, i.e. not trustees, employees or volunteers).
Please keep your application as simple as possible and avoid the use of technical jargon. Please do not include electronic media (e.g. DVDs) with your application.
Your application must be signed and should either be printed on your organisation's headed paper or accompanied by a covering letter on headed paper.
Budget and Supporting Documents (these are required in addition to your four page application)
Budget: a detailed budget for your project must accompany your application. If you are requesting funding over more than one year your budget must reflect this. Please set out costings for each year of the project in separate columns, as well as including a column that provides totals for each item or area of expenditure.
If your request is partly or wholly for salary costs, please ensure that the salary element of your budget is broken down as follows:
- Salary
- National Insurance
- Pension (if applicable)
This is particularly important when requesting a two or three year grant. You can ask us to consider annual salary increases of up to 2% p.a. If the increases in your budget are larger than this, for instance because of a salary scale you have for your staff, the balance will need to be raised elsewhere.
Explain from where the balance of funds will be/has been raised if you are applying to us for part-funding.
Job Description: if the request is for a salary, enclose a job description.
Accounts: your organisation's most recent audited or independently inspected accounts (full accounts are required, not just a SoFA and Balance Sheet). If the accounts show a significant surplus or deficit of income, or high reserves, please explain the reason for this. If the year end date of your accounts is more than 10 months ago, please send up to date management accounts as well as your full accounts.
What will happen to my application?
It will take up to six months to hear the outcome of your application (though applications that are ineligible, or that are not being taken to full assessment stage, will be notified before this).
If an application is not signed or is received without accounts or a budget, it may be declined or returned to you unread. Please read our guidelines carefully before submitting your application.
We receive many more applications than we are able to fund. Unfortunately this means that we often have to turn down good applications.
Our assessment process has four stages. Additional information (such as management accounts, a budget for your organisation, or information about your fundraising position) may be requested during stages two and three.
Stage One: applications are entered onto our system and eligibility checked. We will write to you to acknowledge receipt of your application, or to let you know if it is ineligible, within six weeks of receipt.
Stage Two: eligible applications are initially reviewed by our Grants Team. During this stage our Trustees receive information about the applications, and may be asked to comment on them. Completion of this stage can take up to eight weeks from the date we acknowledge your application, particularly if we have to ask you for any further information. We will contact you at the end of Stage Two to let you know whether or not we will be taking your application forward to the next stage.
Stage Three: if your application reaches this stage, we will ask you for some additional financial information and electronic copy of your application. One of our network of Volunteer Visitors or a member of staff will then contact you to arrange to visit your organisation. The visit enables us to discuss your project with you in more detail, and to find out more about your organisation and the people you work with. Visits can take up to three hours and, as well as exploring your funding request, will look more closely at your organisation's governance, management and fundraising strategy. We would normally expect to meet with staff and a member of your Board/Trustees. Once a visit has taken place, a report is prepared for our Trustees.
Stage Four: Trustees meet quarterly in March, June, September and December. Decisions about whether or not to award grants are made by Trustees at these meetings. A letter notifying you of the outcome will be sent to you within two weeks of the meeting taking place.
We cannot guarantee that your application will go to a particular meeting as this is dependent on the number of applications we receive.
Applicants who are unsuccessful are required to wait a minimum of 12 months from the date of notification before re-applying.
Please note that whilst your application may fit our guidelines, a significant number of applications will be unsuccessful due to the high numbers we receive.
We reserve the right to share with other grant makers information received from applicants requesting funding and from those in receipt of a grant from us, unless an organisation expressly requests otherwise.
Downloadable Documents
Links to documents open in a new window.
Revenue Main Grants Programme Guidelines - Word
Revenue Main Grants Programme Guidelines - PDF
Application Cover Sheet - Word
We recommend that you save the Cover Sheet onto your computer before starting to complete it (select the “save” option when downloading).