Parent-Toddlers group -- how formal should be the accounts, policies, insurance, etc.?

[lljkk]

Anyone faced these issues?

I'm one of the core people that keeps it running, in a village hall; we pay rent but any other funds that come in we plow back into crafts/new toys/snacks, etc. -- all volunteers running it, so purely non-profit. We've got ~£1500 in the bank right now and an annual gross income around £1000-£1500.

What would Inland Revenue think of our income, if they ever came snooping, perhaps we should call ourselves a charity? Although our income is well below the £5k threshold when registration with the charity commission is possible.

Which means we'd be looking at unregistered ("excepted") charity status, does that sound right? In which case I think we still need to comply with charity law, but I'm not exactly sure what "charity law" means!

I'm worried that we should at least have a more formal accounting system with an annual summary of money movements. We do have liability insurance, and a written notice with stuff on it (i hate to write "policies") with things like "Your children are your responsibility at all times", etc.

In my experience you definately need to formalise insurance and basic accounts, in england you can go to the pre school learning association and they will not only give you advice, but offer insurance policies to suit your needs, and a rep will come round once a term and do a craft story with the kids, not a huge amount of effort, as for the books, a big lined book with incomings and outgoings for the month and a min of two people required to sign cheques.

Ta, any more experiences? What does 'charity law' mean?

have you checked the charities commission website? useful for guides
here

also the governance hub