Common questions about Oxfam's rating, finances, and Charity Commission status.
Is Oxfam a good charity? +
Oxfam scores 60 out of 100 (3 stars — Needs improvement) on CharityCompare's Clarity Score, our independent read of its UK regulator filings. Around 68% of its spending goes to charitable activities (3-yr avg) and its accounts are late. That reflects how transparent and financially healthy it looks on paper — it does not measure the real-world impact of its work, so treat it as one factor alongside the cause you care about. CharityCompare never tells you where to donate.
Is Oxfam a legitimate charity? +
The register data used for this profile lists Oxfam as a registered charity (charity number 202918). Verify it on the official register: https://register-of-charities.charitycommission.gov.uk/charity-details/?regId=202918&subId=0. Check the current entry and the identity of anyone requesting money. Registration does not verify a particular appeal; Clarity Score summarises filing transparency, not programme impact.
What is Oxfam's charity number? +
Oxfam's charity number is 202918. Check that number on the official register (Charity Commission, OSCR or CCNI) or this CharityCompare profile before you donate — scammers sometimes reuse real numbers on fake appeals.
What is Oxfam's charity rating? +
Oxfam scores 60 out of 100 on CharityCompare (3 stars — Needs improvement). The Clarity Score (method v1.1) sums four pillars from UK regulator filings: Accountability & Transparency (40 pts), Financial Health (30), Financial Efficiency (20), and Community Support (10). Stars use the same bands as those labels — 90+ is 5★ Exceptional. It is not an impact ranking.
Does Oxfam have reviews and complaints? +
CharityCompare does not host public user reviews for Oxfam. Instead you get a filing-based Clarity Score, cause spend, reserves and red flags such as late accounts (2 red flags on this profile: late accounts filing; high fundraising costs). For formal complaints about a charity, contact the Charity Commission, OSCR, CCNI or the Fundraising Regulator as appropriate.
How much of my donation reaches Oxfam? +
Across the recent disclosed accounts used for this score, 68% of Oxfam's total spending went to charitable activities (3-yr avg across disclosed years). That is the closest official figure to "how much of your donation reaches the cause" — it is an average across all spending in the filing, not a pound-by-pound breakdown of an individual gift.
What are Oxfam's overheads? +
Across the recent disclosed accounts used for this score, fundraising costs were about 32% of total expenditure and fundraising plus separately reported governance figures amount to about 32% of expenditure (2023–2025, disclosed years); these categories can overlap, so this is not a distinct total of all administration costs at Oxfam. Oxfam's annual return for the year ending 31 March 2025 reports 94 employees paid more than £60,000, including 11 employees paid more than £100,000. The highest reported pay band is £150,001–£200,000 (1 employee). Individual salaries, including the chief executive's, are disclosed in the trustees' annual report rather than on the register.
How much income does Oxfam receive? +
Oxfam reported £339m total income in its 2025 accounts, based on UK regulator filings. Five-year trend: stable.
Are Oxfam's accounts up to date? +
Filing status: late (last filing 2025-12-18). CharityCompare flags late or missing accounts separately from the financial score.
Where is Oxfam based? +
Oxfam's registered contact address is in Oxford (OX4 2JY). It tells the regulator it operates in Afghanistan, Angola, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Bangladesh, Bolivia, with a focus on international aid.
How much is Oxfam's chief executive paid? +
The Charity Commission register does not name individual salaries. Oxfam's annual return for the year ending 31 March 2025 reports 94 employees paid more than £60,000, including 11 employees paid more than £100,000. The highest reported pay band is £150,001–£200,000 (1 employee). Charities normally disclose the chief executive's pay, or the pay of their highest-paid staff, in the remuneration note of the trustees' annual report and accounts.
Where does Oxfam's money come from? +
Oxfam reported £339m total income for the year ending 31 March 2025. The largest sources were charitable activities £129m (38%), donations and legacies £107m (31%), trading and fundraising events £99m (29%). Legacies (gifts in wills) contributed £19m.
Can I claim Gift Aid on a donation to Oxfam? +
The register records Oxfam as registered with HMRC for Gift Aid, so a UK taxpayer can usually add 25p to every £1 they give by making a Gift Aid declaration.
Are Oxfam's trustees paid? +
Oxfam's annual return for the year ending 31 March 2025 reports that no trustee received remuneration or other benefits from the charity.
When was Oxfam registered as a charity? +
Oxfam was entered on the register on 7 September 1965. It is also a company registered at Companies House (company number 00612172).
How does CharityCompare score Oxfam? +
We calculate a Clarity Score of 0–100 from four pillars in Oxfam's regulator filings: Accountability & Transparency (40 points — filing history, trustees, policies), Financial Health (30 — reserves, income trend, debt), Financial Efficiency (20 — cause spend and fundraising cost, on a graduated scale) and Community Support (10 — volunteer-to-staff ratio). An open statutory inquiry scores 0. The score measures reporting on paper, not programme impact. CharityCompare is free for donors, takes no commission on donations, and scores cannot be bought.
How often is this page updated? +
This profile was last updated on 6 September 2026 from the latest UK regulator data available to CharityCompare, and Oxfam's most recent accounts cover 2025. Scores and figures refresh whenever we re-ingest the register, so the page reflects our latest data pull rather than a one-off review.