A Christian charity breached the Code of Fundraising Practice during a campaign to fundraise for a new building, the Fundraising Regulator has found.
St Thomas Mar Thoma Church, based in Bristol, “failed to achieve its objectives” during its Agape Project fundraising campaign to raise £150,000 for the new building.
The regulator found the charity failed to follow the code in some respects by not buying the building within the time limit it had set itself.
The Agape Project was approved by the charity in August 2021 and involved selling its existing vicarage while settling an outstanding mortgage on the church building and buying a new site with improved facilities.
The project aimed to buy a new building within 100 days but, although the charity was unable to reach its target during that period, it did still make an offer on and then buy a new building shortly after, the regulator found.
“The complainant brought their complaint to us anonymously, explaining that the building purchased did not meet the requirements of the charity and that the donors should be refunded, as the campaign had failed,” the regulator said.
“We thought that the charity failed to follow the code in some respects – namely that it didn’t consider, nor inform donors, what it would do with funds if it was unable to achieve the campaign objectives.”
The regulator said while the campaign goals in terms of the time limits and total funds raised had not been achieved, it was satisfied that the charity had achieved its overall goal of purchasing the replacement building.
“We did not agree that the building bought by the charity was outside of the campaign’s objectives, but we thought that the charity could have been clearer about its requirements,” the regulator said.
“From the information we considered, the only conditions for the new vicarage were that it was detached, had four bedrooms and cost approximately £500,000.”
The regulator said it did not think the charity’s failure to follow the code would have swayed donors against supporting the campaign.
“There were issues in relation to complaint handling, although the charity did look into the matter when we asked it to,” the regulator said.
“We also considered the allegations of pressured fundraising but did not have enough information to come to a view on this.”
The regulator said that from what it had seen, the charity did not immediately recognise the campaign as regulated fundraising because it had primarily directed its fundraising efforts towards its own members.
“We recommended that, should the charity decide to continue with fundraising activities, it undertakes a thorough review of its policies and procedures and considers the requirements of the Code of Fundraising Practice,” the regulator said.
“The charity accepted our findings and recommendations and will be informing its members of the recommendations soon as it seeks to implement these.”
St Thomas Mar Thoma Church has been contacted for comment.