You cannot change your charity’s financial year or period if your latest annual return and accounts (if required) are overdue.
Rules for charities that are not companies
If your charity is a charitable incorporated organisation (CIO) or unincorporated (not a company) you can change the financial year or period to run for more or less than 12 months.
It needs to be a minimum of 6 months, and no longer than 18 months.
You can only:
- change the dates for your current financial year
- make a change once every 3 years
Changing your financial year or period will also change your deadline for filing the annual return and accounts.
Rules for charities that are companies
If your charity is incorporated (a company) you can shorten your financial year or period as often as you’d like.
The minimum period you can shorten it to is 1 day.
You can lengthen your company’s financial year to a maximum of 18 months, but this can only be done once every 5 financial periods.
Rules for newly registered charities
If your charity is newly registered, and you have not submitted an annual return you will need to request permission to change your financial year.
To sign in and change your financial year you will need your:
- charity registration number
- charity’s online services password, you can request a new password if needed
This password gives people in your charity access to detailed information about your charity and individuals connected with it.
When giving access to this password you need to have measures in place to make sure the system is only used for proper purposes, and that the information accessed through the Commission’s services will be treated carefully and sensitively and in accordance with legal requirements including the General Data Protection Regulations (GDPR).
Read the privacy notice before you use the service.