Industries: charities
Charity software that volunteers pick up without training
£40,000
A rota that swaps shifts without the group chat, a Gift Aid claim drafted from a year of bank lines, and a grant file that is ready when the funder asks for the report. Built around what your charity does, next to the accounts you already keep.
A charity runs on volunteers and a treasurer's evenings
Charity software in the UK has to work for people who are not paid to use it. A charity in Norwich with a community pantry and a befriending café easily has forty volunteers, a part-time coordinator and trustees who meet once a month. The paperwork happens in the evenings: next week's rota, the Gift Aid claim, the report the grant funder wants by January.
This page sets out what we can build for each of those jobs, which rules come with running a charity in England and Wales, from the Charity Commission to HMRC and the ICO, and how much software suits a charity run by volunteers or one with twenty staff. Your accounts stay where they are; what we build connects to them.
Rotas in a group chat, Gift Aid in a spreadsheet
Most charities run on whatever was free when they started: a shared spreadsheet of members, a group chat for the rota, a folder of receipts and a bank export the treasurer works through line by line once a year. It holds until the charity grows or the treasurer steps down.
| Job | How it often goes | With software built for you |
|---|---|---|
| The rota | A group chat, whoever answers first | Shifts on the phone, swaps in one tap, gaps the coordinator can see |
| Volunteer expenses | Receipts in an envelope | A photo of the receipt, repaid at actual cost |
| Gift Aid | Matching donors to declarations by hand | Donations linked to declarations, gaps flagged |
| Grants | Hunting for invoices when the report is due | Each cost tagged to its grant as it comes in |
| Supporters | A spreadsheet in three versions | One record with gifts, memberships and consent |
Which one comes first depends on where the evenings go. A custom CRM for supporters is a different project from a volunteer rota, and the first rarely needs to be large.
A volunteer's Saturday, with nothing to install
- Nothing to installA link in the email opens the shifts. Anyone who hates passwords signs in with a code by text.
- Swaps without the group chatCan't make it? Offer the shift. Volunteers who said they were free that day get the request, and the coordinator sees who takes it.
- Expenses with a receiptBus fares and mileage go in with a photo of the receipt, so volunteers are repaid actual costs and nothing more.
An example of what we can build, with made-up names and addresses. You choose what a shift shows.
A rota that knows who holds the keys
A volunteer of seventy and a student of nineteen both need to find their shift. So we build a web app that opens from a link in an email, with a code by text instead of a password, and shows each person only what their role needs. The coordinator sees the gaps, the trustees see the figures, and nobody sees the names of the people the pantry serves.
The rota knows how many people each shift needs. When someone drops out, it does not message everyone; it asks the volunteers who said they were free that day and tells the rest once the shift is covered. The same system can hold staff scheduling for paid roles, so the coordinator works from one screen.
A cancelled café shift, covered without a phone round
Befriending café short on Wednesday
Lucy can't make Wednesday. Without her, Sam runs the befriending café alone, and the café needs two volunteers.
Three volunteers marked Wednesday as free. Hannah replies first and is booked; the other two hear it is covered.
Hannah covers, Sam has been told: Confirmed by the coordinator
An example of what we can build, with made-up volunteers. You set how many people each shift needs.
Gift Aid claims without the January scramble
Gift Aid adds 25p to every £1 a UK taxpayer gives, as long as the charity holds a declaration and can link each donation to it. HMRC expects a record of every donation claimed on and of any benefit given in return. For gifts up to £100 a benefit can be worth up to 25 percent of the gift; above that, £25 plus 5 percent of the amount over £100, with a ceiling of £2,500.
The work sits in the bank export. Memberships, refunds and donations arrive mixed together, and a monthly £5 donor only matters once the year is added up. AI reads the export, links each donation to a declaration, sets memberships aside, lists donors with no declaration on file and holds back anything where a benefit may be over the limit. The treasurer checks the draft before it goes to HMRC.
A year of bank lines becomes a draft claim
An example of what we can build, with made-up names and figures. The AI drafts, a person decides.
Grant reports built from what you already record
A council grant, a lottery-funded project, a community foundation award: each has its own form and its own idea of a report. The time goes on searching afterwards. Which invoice belongs to which grant, where is the March attendance register, how much is left to spend before the grant ends?
We tag each cost to a grant file when it comes in. The file shows the award, what has been spent and what still needs accounting for, with the receipts attached. When the end of grant report is due, the bundle is ready. How a cost is treated in the accounts stays a question for your accountant or independent examiner; we make sure it can be found.
A grant file with every receipt already in place
Trustees and the treasurer follow the file through a secure link. The funder gets the end of grant report with the receipts in one bundle.
An example of what we can build, with a made-up grant and amounts.
Found for volunteering in your town
Volunteer sign-up
Befriending café, Wednesday afternoons and some Saturdays
Hannah, Norwich, yesterday 21:10
- A page per volunteering role, with the time it takes
- A Google profile with your venues and opening hours
- A sign-up form that lands straight in the rota
Example with made-up charities and reviews.
Volunteers and donors find you on your own site
People look for volunteering by town and by role: driving, befriending, a pantry shift. A charity site that gets found has a page for each role with the time it takes, and a sign-up form that lands in the rota rather than an inbox. We build that as part of website design and the local search that puts your venues on the map.
The donation page belongs there too, with the Gift Aid declaration in the same form, so the record exists from the first gift instead of being chased afterwards.
The right amount of software at each size
A charity with no staff does not need an ERP. The question is which job costs the most evenings.
| Charity | What usually does the job | What we would add |
|---|---|---|
| Volunteers only, a board of trustees | An accounts package or cash book, a shared drive | A rota on the phone and a supporter list |
| Up to five paid staff | An accounts package, a payroll provider | Rota, expenses and a draft Gift Aid claim |
| Twenty to fifty staff and volunteer teams | Accounts package plus a list per project | Grant files, a supporter CRM, integrations |
| Larger, several sites | A separate tool per team | One platform across the projects |
Whether a CRM or something broader fits, CRM or ERP walks through the difference, and what custom software costs covers the budget side. A charity that runs a nursery or a physio service has a second trade to cover too: see what we build for nurseries and for physiotherapists.
Charity Commission, HMRC and the ICO, in the software
These rules apply to registered charities in England and Wales. Software does not do the work for you, but it can keep the records the work depends on.
| Rule | What it asks | What the software keeps |
|---|---|---|
| Annual return | Within 10 months of the year end, for charities with income over £10,000; larger charities send the accounts and trustees' report with it | A reminder and the year's figures in one place |
| Accounts and scrutiny | For years ending from 30 September 2026: independent examination above £40,000 income, audit above £1.5 million | Income by year against the thresholds |
| Receipts and payments | A charity that is not a company may use them up to £500,000 income, up from £250,000; above that, accruals accounts under the Charities SORP | The basis you report on, chosen once |
| Gift Aid | A declaration for each donor, a record of each donation and of any benefit given | Donations linked to declarations, benefits checked against the limit |
| UK GDPR and PECR | A lawful basis for each use, and an opt-out in every fundraising message | Where each contact came from and who opted out |
| Fundraising Regulator | The Code of Fundraising Practice, and suppressing people who use the Fundraising Preference Service | A suppression list that every mailing respects |
The new accounting thresholds come from the Charity Commission's guidance updated in September 2026. A charitable company keeps its Gift Aid records for six years after the end of the accounting period. For anything on tax or VAT, ask your accountant.
A charity with 45 volunteers, in hours a year
Run it again with your own figures. Moving lists out of spreadsheets is the subject of replacing Excel with software.
One conversation, a fixed price, then the first module
- An evening in your adminWe ask what the coordinator and the treasurer do in an ordinary month, which lists exist and what the trustees want to see.
- A price before we buildTogether we pick a first piece, usually the rota or Gift Aid, with a fixed price for the project.
- A real week as the testA handful of volunteers use the rota for a week. Whatever they can't find gets fixed before everyone else is invited.
- Growing once it worksSupporters, grants or the link to your accounts package follow, one piece at a time.
We have no charity client yet, but for Business Centrum in Ghent we built a management platform that replaces their spreadsheet, with files, documents, tasks and a portal for their clients.
Trustees and coordinators usually ask
Does a small charity with no staff need custom software?
Rarely for everything. A small charity manages with an accounts package and a shared drive. Custom software pays where a job comes back every week and touches many people, like a rota for forty volunteers.
Does the software submit the Gift Aid claim to HMRC?
It drafts the claim and the schedule of donations. The treasurer or an authorised official checks and submits it, because the charity answers for every donation it claims on.
Can volunteers use the rota on their own phones?
Yes. It is a web app: a link opens their shifts, with nothing to install. Each volunteer sees only what their role needs, and access ends when they leave.
Where is our supporters' data kept?
On servers in the UK or the EU, under a data processing agreement between the charity and us. Two-step sign-in is on for anyone who sees more than their own shifts.
Does this replace our accounts package?
No. The accounts stay in your package or with your accountant. We build what sits alongside and connect it, so nobody types the same figure twice.
What does charity software cost?
It depends on what we build. After a first conversation you get a fixed price for the project, and our services page shows the kind of work that covers.
Custom software
How VBS helps you with this
We build the platform your business runs on every day: your spreadsheets, emails and paperwork in one system that does what you do.
- Your workflow mapped first, then a fixed price
- Screens for the office, the client and the road
- Hosting, backups and security managed by us on AWS
How we approach it is on our page about Custom software.
A rota that has left the group chat?
Tell us how many volunteers your charity has and where the treasurer's evenings go. We will tell you where we would start.
Rather get in touch right away?