A CIO is a corporate body (like a company) with a constitution that is registered with and regulated by the Charity Commission. We can offer advice about whether a CIO is right for you and help you to set up or convert an existing charity.

A CIC (social enterprise) is defined as a business with primarily social objectives, whose surpluses are principally reinvested for that purpose in the business or in the community. We can offer you advice on this legal structure and help you set up a CIC.

All companies have the right to alter their articles by special resolution or written resolution. Some changes need consent or special procedure. Get in touch for support around changing your company articles.

A ‘charitable company’ is an organisation that has first become an incorporated organisation and then has registered as a charity. We can offer advice and guidance on different legal structures and help you set up a charitable company.

A charity is an organisation with exclusively charitable purposes that benefit the public. Charities must operate within the constraints of charity law. We can offer advice and help you register as a charity.

Would you like to know what is involved in setting up a new voluntary organisation or community group? We outline a few things to consider and our Support and Development team are here offer for further advice.

Many organisations think about changing legal structure when the trustees and management committees are concerned about personal liability. Incorporation means creating a legal identity for the organisation that is different to its members.

You should think about becoming a charitable incorporated organisation if your charity has employees, owns property, signs contracts to complete work, has long-term financial commitments such as a lease or runs risky activities.

Each organisation has a group of people (management committee trustee board) that is responsible by law for running the organisation and making sure it does what it sets out to do. The people in these groups can be called management committee members or trustees.

From 1 August 2018 the ‘automatic disqualification rules’ for trustees and management committees changed, and for the first time have been extended to being employed by a charity as the senior manager, usually the chief executive, and possibly a chief finance officer.

The management committee members of a voluntary and community group (not registered as a charity) are responsible for setting up and maintaining their organisation.

The main responsibility of the trustees of a charity is to make sure that their organisation is run properly; works within the rules stated in its governing document and does not break the