Trustee Event Peterborough 5th October 2006

Peterborough CVS are organising an event for trustees in Peterborough on Thursday 5th October 2006. For more details http://www.pcvs.co.uk/pcvsnews.html

BTEC students meet Voluntary Sector Minister

A special presentation was held in Doncaster yesterday when a group of charity managers who are among the first in the UK to achieve the BTEC Professional Certificate in Voluntary Sector Management, met Ed Milliband, MP for Doncaster North and Minister for the Voluntary Sector.

Speaking at the event, Mr Milliband spoke of some of the challenges facing the sector and acknowledged the achievement of the students who have supplemented their knowledge and skills as a result of completing their BTEC studies after 12 months.

Pictured from left to right: Joel Weaver, Tony Gibbs (charitytraining.com), Lesley Brown, John Ellis, Gail Pullman, Helen Howard, Ed Milliband MP, Jayne Chudley (charitytraining.com), Paul Hemingway, Anne Hammond and Jan Williams.

With thanks to Kathryn and the TMRP team for organising the event

The legal need for a Risk Assessment

The Charities Commission says that, unlike their Commercial Trustee counterparts, Charity Trustees are normally not as involved in the day to day management and operations of their charities.

It was felt a legal requirement was needed to encourage Charity Trustees to look ahead and visualize possible risks their charities might face and to develop steps to minimize their danger and then REPORT this in WRITING to the Charities Commission.

EuroDM and DRF Group, with the help of charities who have completed their own Risk Assessments and by consulting with lawyer's specializing in this area, has developed a new Guide that can be a roadmap in meeting the New requirements of SORP 2000 and updated with the 2005 additions.

Get your FREE copy online direct from the DRF Group website at: FREE copy available at http://www.eurodm-drfgroup.co.uk

Before your Trustees get into trouble for failing to notify the Charities Commission, you may want to read this new guide - Risk Assessment, A Trustee's Responsibilities under SORP 2000, and include your Risk Assessment Report with your next Annual Report to the Charities Commission.

You MUST tell the Charities Commission that you have determined what your major Risks are and what steps you are taking to deal with them! Features of the new Guide include:* Justification for the new requirement* What is the Legal requirement to assess risk* How to assess risk* Deciding what action to take* Need for keeping risks under review*

Writing a Risk Assessment report

Find out how easy it is to meet the legal requirements of SORP 2000 at NO COST, visit the web site http://www.eurodm-drfgroup.co.uk

Normal service will soon be resumed...

... if you have found our usually high standards of repartee and service a bit lacking over the past few days, please bear with us as we have endured not one, but two attempts by local yobs to break in to the charitytraining offices (yes, we have them on CCTV).

Obviously the appeal of reading some of those BTEC assignments has been proving too much for some people who can't wait to get their hands on them! Hmm... just how long will it be before we see 2,000 words on the 'Joys of working with my charity' being offered on ebay?

Having started each morning this week sweeping up mountains of glass and tidying up, it's taken up valuable time usually spent supporting our lovely learners and caring customers. Normal service will soon be resumed...

Thanks to Paul and Pete and the rest of the guys and gals next door for their support - it's much appreciated.

Charity mail-outs effective claims Institute

Charities are one of the major winners in the world of direct marketing, new research has discovered.

The findings come as the Institute of Fundraising is preparing to draw up the first direct mail code of fundraising practice, aimed at setting best practice and legal standards for direct mail fundraising.

The research found that charities were one of the most effective organisations in using direct mail, along with travel and holiday companies and banks. The retail sector came out on top, judged to be making the best use of direct mail.

”There is a need to fully address best practice standards for charity fundraising by direct mail. The development of this direct mail code offers working party members a unique opportunity to start with a blank sheet of paper and develop a brand new code for fundraising in the 21st century,” said policy and standards manager Laura Thomas.

Whether or not the new tariff of charges just introduced by Royal Mail will have a big impact on the use of direct mail by charities remains to be seen, but the cost of mailing the charitytraining.com Course Guide (pictured) has now increased substantially as a result of the new postal charges, and so inevitably we will be reviewing our use of print to be mailed out in the months ahead: inevitably this means that we may rely more on the use of our (new) web site and email for the distribution of information. Will other organisations in the voluntary sector follow suit?