Gift Aid

Gift Aid allows the parish to reclaim 25p from HMRC for every £1 donated by a UK taxpayer — at no cost to the donor. Church Cashbook provides a complete workflow for managing declarations, linking donations, preparing GASDS records, and exporting claim data.

What Gift Aid is

Gift Aid is a UK government scheme that lets charities — including Parochial Church Councils — reclaim the basic rate of income tax on donations made by UK taxpayers. When a donor gives £1 and has signed a Gift Aid declaration, the PCC can claim an additional 25p from HMRC, making the total value of the gift £1.25. The donor pays nothing extra; the reclaim comes from tax they have already paid.

To claim Gift Aid on a donation, three conditions must all be met:

The donor is an individual UK taxpayer who has paid (or will pay) at least as much income tax or capital gains tax in that tax year as the total Gift Aid that will be reclaimed on all their charitable giving.
The donation is a genuine gift — the donor receives no goods or significant benefit in return.
The PCC holds a valid Gift Aid declaration signed by the donor that covers the date of the donation.

Gift Aid cannot be claimed on donations made by companies, on collections where the money comes from several people pooled together, on raffle or lottery ticket purchases, or on payments made in exchange for a ticket, entry fee, or any other benefit.

Eligible donor check: It is the donor's responsibility to ensure they have paid enough tax. If they have not, HMRC will seek the shortfall from the donor, not the PCC. Encourage donors to tell you promptly if their tax status changes.

Declarations

A Gift Aid declaration is the signed (or written) permission from a donor that allows the PCC to claim Gift Aid on their donations. Without a valid declaration on file, no claim can be made — even if the donor is a taxpayer and the donation would otherwise qualify.

A declaration must include the donor's full name, their full home postal address (as registered with HMRC), and a statement that they are a UK taxpayer. It can cover a single donation, a defined period, or all past and future donations to the PCC — the most common approach is an open-ended declaration covering all gifts, which the donor can cancel at any time.

To record a declaration in Church Cashbook, go to Gift Aid → Declarations and select Add declaration. You will need to enter:

The donor's full name
Their full home address including postcode
The date the declaration was signed
Whether it covers past donations, future donations, or both

Personal data: Gift Aid declarations contain sensitive personal information. All donor details are stored in encrypted form and are only visible to users with the Treasurer role or above. Viewers cannot access declaration data.

Once a declaration is recorded, it appears in the declarations list with its status shown. A declaration remains active until it is cancelled or until its end date is reached. If a donor moves house or changes their name, you can note the updated details against the existing declaration — you do not need to create a new one, but you should keep a record of when the change was notified.

Record keeping: HMRC requires Gift Aid records to be kept for six years after the end of the accounting period to which they relate. Do not delete or cancel declarations simply because a donor has stopped giving — retain them for the full period.

Linking donations

Recording a declaration does not automatically make a donor's transactions eligible for Gift Aid. Each donation must be explicitly linked to a declaration before it can be included in a claim. This two-step process reflects the HMRC requirement that there is a clear, auditable link between each donation and the declaration that authorises the claim.

To link donations, go to Gift Aid → Link donations. The screen shows transactions that have not yet been linked. For each transaction you wish to include, select the matching declaration from the list. Only declarations that were active on the date of the donation will appear as options.

Once linked, a transaction is marked as Gift Aid eligible and will appear in the annual report and export figures. A transaction can only be linked to one declaration, and a declaration can cover multiple transactions.

Back-dating: You can claim Gift Aid on donations made up to four years before the date of your claim, provided a valid declaration was in place at the time of the donation. GASDS claims must be submitted within two years of the end of the tax year in which the donations were made.

Candidates and exceptions

The Gift Aid → Candidates screen helps you identify transactions that may be eligible for linking but have not yet been processed. It shows income transactions for the selected financial year and highlights which donors have active declarations, making it easier to spot donations that could be linked without having to check each one manually.

The screen also flags exceptions — situations where a transaction cannot be claimed. Common exceptions include:

No declaration on file for the donor on the date of the donation
A declaration that has been cancelled or whose end date falls before the donation date
Transactions that are not eligible by type (for example, non-cash payments that do not qualify)

Reviewing the candidates screen regularly — particularly before preparing a claim — helps ensure you are capturing all eligible donations and not missing out on reclaim income.

Gift Aid Small Donations Scheme (GASDS)

The Gift Aid Small Donations Scheme allows PCCs to claim a Gift Aid-style top-up on small cash and contactless card donations of £30 or less, without needing a signed declaration from each donor. This is particularly relevant for plate collections and other anonymous giving where obtaining individual declarations is not practical.

Key rules for GASDS:

Each individual donation must be £30 or less.
The PCC must have been claiming Gift Aid in the normal way for at least two of the previous four tax years.
The total GASDS claim in any tax year is capped at ten times the amount claimed under standard Gift Aid in that year, up to a maximum of £8,000 of donations (producing a top-up of up to £2,000).
GASDS claims are made on a tax year basis (6 April to 5 April) and must be submitted within two years of the end of that tax year.
You cannot claim both standard Gift Aid and GASDS on the same donation.

To record GASDS donations, go to Gift Aid → GASDS. You can add entries for eligible collections, recording the date, amount, and any relevant notes. The system maintains a running total for the tax year so you can track progress against the cap.

Counting requirements: HMRC requires that cash collections counted under GASDS are counted by two unrelated individuals. If your church's counting procedures do not meet this standard, GASDS claims on those collections may be disallowed. Ensure your processes are in order before making a claim.

Annual report and preparing a claim

The Gift Aid → Annual report screen provides a summary of all Gift Aid activity for a selected financial year, showing total eligible donations, linked declarations, GASDS totals, and the estimated reclaim value. Use this screen to review your figures before submitting a claim to HMRC.

When you are satisfied the figures are correct, use the Export function to produce a CSV file in the format required for submission via HMRC's Charities Online service. The export includes all the donation details HMRC requires: donor names, addresses, donation dates, and amounts.

The claim is then submitted directly to HMRC through the Charities Online Government Gateway — Church Cashbook does not submit claims on your behalf. The export provides the schedule spreadsheet data that you upload during the claim process. HMRC typically processes online claims within four weeks and pays by bank transfer.

Claim frequency: There is no requirement to claim annually — some PCCs claim more frequently. However, for most parishes an annual claim after the financial year end is straightforward and keeps the process manageable. Claims can be made up to four years retrospectively if donations were missed in earlier years.

Data privacy and retention

Gift Aid declarations contain personal data — donor names, home addresses, and financial information — and are therefore subject to UK GDPR. Church Cashbook handles this data as follows:

All personal data in declarations is encrypted at rest. It cannot be read by anyone who does not have authorised access to the system.
Access to Gift Aid records is restricted to users with the Treasurer role or above. Viewers and other roles cannot see declaration details.
Donor data is never included in general transaction exports or reports — only in the dedicated Gift Aid export.

HMRC requires Gift Aid records to be kept for six years after the end of the accounting period to which they relate. For declarations that cover ongoing gifts, best practice is to retain the declaration for the full period during which gifts continue and for six years thereafter. Do not delete declarations simply because a donor has stopped attending or giving.

If a donor asks what personal data the PCC holds about them, the declaration record in Church Cashbook is the primary source. Donors have the right to ask for inaccurate information to be corrected. If a donor asks for their data to be deleted, take legal advice before acting — HMRC retention requirements may override a deletion request for declarations linked to claims that have already been submitted.

Scheduled anonymisation: A future version of Church Cashbook will include automatic anonymisation of declaration data for donors where the six-year HMRC retention window has passed and no active claims remain open. Until that feature is available, the treasurer should review the declarations list periodically and anonymise or remove data that is no longer required, subject to HMRC retention rules.

Roles and permissions

Gift Aid functions are available to users with the following roles:

Treasurer — full access to all Gift Aid functions including declarations, linking, GASDS, reporting, and exports.
Viewer — no access to Gift Aid data. Viewers cannot see declarations, donor names, or addresses.
Church Examiner — read-only access to Gift Aid summaries for the purpose of independent examination. Cannot see individual donor details.
Deanery Administrator / Superadmin — administrative access as required; personal donor data is subject to the same access controls.

Principle of least privilege: Only give the Treasurer role to users who genuinely need access to Gift Aid donor data. A user who only needs to enter transactions does not need to see declaration details and should be assigned the Viewer role.