News & Forthcoming Events
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Last Update: 26.11.21 During 2021, the details of our work are: 86 Grants completed to date Our Activity in Recent Years:
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£100,217.33 |
Analysis of the above figures shows that in a typical year just over 50% of our grants are classified as "Small" ie £1,000 and under, andrequire 20% to 25% of our grant funding. This shows the importance of small targeted grants to help families. We have analysed the figures for the last 4 years and we have found consistent results. Many of the bigger items of equipment exceed the £1,000 threshold, even with the various discounts we are able to negotiate, which shows that significant help can often be provided at a relatively low cost.
News about the Charity:
With completion of the 55th Grant of 2020 we reached the milestone of £900,000 raised and granted without taking a single penny from the Charity in administration costs. Everything donated was used for the benefit of the children. While we hope to target our next big milestone by 2021, we are increasingly limited by the funding we can raise, especially with the impact of COVID 19 on the suspension of so many fundraising activities. We shall be more dependent than ever on the wonderful help we receive from our supporters as we start 2021 with grants completed to date of £921,000.
We never anticipated the rate of growth we have seen, or the amount already granted when we started. Sadly this clearly highlights how serious the problems are in this area and how much help is needed.
Donations:
There are full details on our Donation Page of the various methods of making a donation to us, as well as the Everyclick Donation button (centre of the Donation Page), which allows an online donation to be made quickly by Credit or Debit card.
We would also like to highlight the help that can be given by commission payments on purchases (at no cost to the purchaser - just nominate the Charity) eg Amazon Smile, Give as You Live, and from recycling ink cartridges - Recycle for Charity. Details of how to help, at no cost, are on the Donation page of this website.
Current and Future Events in 2021:
We can only hope that many of the groups that collect for us are once again able to meet, when we can begin to relax the lockdown rules. We have already received £117.43 from a collection at Pens Meadow School to start the year off. We would also like to thank the Geoff Hill Trust for a donation of £500.00 and several personal donors. We have received some help from the Grove Foundation, the Jane Hodge Foundation, the Rowlands Trust and the We Are All Making a Difference Charity. We are very grateful to all of them, as it has helped us to cope with a surge in applications during Q2.
Can we register a thank you to several personal donors and to one anonymous donor who contributed via our Give as You Live/Everyclick webpage. With recent grants plus a number of pending applications (awaiting supporting paperwork), the funds will be a great help.
On 6th April we filed our annual Gift Aid claim which was paid by HMRC in four working days. The funding received has been put to immediate use.
We continue to receive periodic payments from the PayPal Giving Fund as a result of donations from supporters. We do not know either the identity or number of donors, but may we say thank you to everyone who chooses to support us through their donations via the PayPal Giving Fund.
Several Individuals/Groups have recently held events/collections for us, and we are awaiting receipt of £1000.00, transferred from a GoFundMe webpage to the PayPal Giving Fund for payout, following a recent successful fundraising. There will be a delay in receiving the funds as we are unable to open an account with the PayPal Giving Fund due to our use of a PO Box number to protect the privacy of the Trustees. However, we shall eventually receive payment by cheque from them, and we would like to thank all of those involved as it really does help us. As at mid August, we have received approx £400.00 of the £1,000.00 due from Paypal.
During August, our Independent Examiner held a retirement party with a request for no presents, only consideration of a donation to the Charity. The event raised approx £2,200.00, which is a great help to our funding.
Q3 has seen exceptional activity and towards the end of September we have had to introduce what we hope will be a short waiting list as we continue to try to raise funds, having exhausted our reserves after the exceptional level of requests for help.
In the last two weeks we have received several small donations from Charitable Foundations (one for £500.00 and one for £1,000.00) and several personal donations of the same order. This has enabled us to manage to keep moving approved grants through a short waiting list, as funding becomes available. Currently the delay is around one week, but fundraising is difficult at present. With Q4 normally expected to be busy, the final quarter of the year will be a challenge.
In early October we received a grant of £7,500.00 from Alloy Wire International which allowed us to clear the waiting list and give us a small reserve for further requests for help
As of early October we have committed sufficient grant funding to have reached our milestone of £1 Million raised and granted with zero administration cost. With delays of material supplies to various equipment manufacturers, we have not yet been invoiced for the complete amount necessary to reach the milestone. We have the funds and we are expecting to complete the target by mid November, which will be 18 years since we started.
News of Recent Grants Made:
Below is a link to a file detailing the first 50 grants made in 2021, which took us to the start of August. The link will be updated when we complete more than 75 grants:
The first 76 Grants
made in 2021