Information about charities failing to submit documents to OSCR on time.
Charities entered into the Scottish Charity Register are
required to submit an Annual Return and accounts to us.
Charities with an annual gross income of £25,000 or above are also
required to submit a Supplementary Monitoring Return. These
documents must be submitted within 9 months of the financial year
end for accounting periods that start on or after 1st April
2006.
Documents not submitted on time
Where charities fail to submit their documents on time, we will
take the following action:
- Immediately after the deadline for submission, a charity's
individual entry on the Scottish Charity Register will indicate
that the Annual Return is "overdue".
- Ten weeks after the deadline the Annual Return status of the
charity's entry in the Scottish Charity Register will change from
"active" to "passed to
compliance" to indicate that the charity has been referred
to the Compliance Support team.
- Charities that have still not provided an Annual Return,
including the Supplementary Monitoring Return if appropriate,
and/or accounts within 6 months of the deadline for submission will
be listed as defaulting charities.
Charities that fail to provide OSCR with the required
documents within 12 months of the deadline for submission may be
considered for removal from the Scottish Charity
Register.
Continued failure to submit documents
Section 45 of the
Charities and Trustee Investment (Scotland) Act 2005 gives us
powers to appoint an accountant to prepare accounts for a
charity. Should we make use of these powers, charity trustees
will be held personally liable for any costs incurred and the
expenses of the person preparing the accounts.
Section 29 of the
2005 Act, gives us powers to serve a notice on charity trustees
requesting documents or information which we consider necessary for
the purposes of an inquiry. Any person who fails to comply with
such a requirement, without reasonable excuse, is guilty of
an offence and is liable on summary conviction to
a fine not exceeding level 4 on the standard scale
(£2,500) or to imprisonment for a period
of up to three months, or both.
Searching for defaulting charities
You can search for defaulting charities on the Scottish
Charity Register.