Practical Guidance To Help Charities Tackle Common Misconceptions

Charities play a vital role in society but this is at risk if the public misunderstand what a charity does and how it operates.

Over 200,000 charities, providing a diverse range of services, are registered with charity regulators in the UK. These include working with disadvantaged groups, contributing to tackling mental health conditions, promoting the arts, amateur sport and much more.

Inherently charities care deeply about the causes they serve, but they also have to operate professionally or they might not survive. They can attract criticism about whether they are using the right mix of volunteers and paid employees, or whether too much is being spent on senior managers and overheads. Isolated incidents of malpractice in the charity sector can also influence public perceptions.

In this guide, ICAEW tackle 10 common myths about how the voluntary sector operates in public