Skip to content

Arts & culture · Reg 212406

The Authors' Contingency Fund

27 /100

Clarity score

Poor

Charity accounts, evidence & financial rating

27/100 Clarity Score · 2 stars · Charity Commission filings · How we score

Register checked 4 October 2026 · latest accounts 2025

Official regulator data
Donate
Compare this charity View accounts

Work at The Authors' Contingency Fund? Claim this profile free to add your charity’s description. Claiming never changes the score.

Quick answer

Is The Authors' Contingency Fund a good charity?

The Authors' Contingency Fund scores 27/100 (2 stars, Poor) on CharityCompare's Clarity Score, calculated from its UK regulator filings. Its latest accounts year is 2025 (£49k total income, cause-spend split not disclosed). This reflects financial transparency and stewardship on paper — not the real-world impact of its programmes. See the full breakdown.

Income

£49k

Accounts 2025-12-31

Spending

£105k

Accounts 2025-12-31

Charitable activities

Not disclosed

No separate spending figure

Accounts filing

On time

Charity Commission

On this pageJump to a section
London · UK-wide · WC1R 4EH Reg 212406 Registered charity Official website Charity Commission register

What does The Authors' Contingency Fund do?

Provides emergency financial help to authors

Activities reported by the charity on the official register · extract . This is separate from the accounts data used for its rating.

The Authors' Contingency Fund hasn't added a description directly to CharityCompare yet. Work here? Add it free →

How much does The Authors' Contingency Fund raise and spend?

Accounts period 2025-01-01 to 2025-12-31 · Source: Charity Commission filings

The Authors' Contingency Fund revenue and expenses for 2025
Category Amount % of spend
Total income £49k —
Total expenditure £105k —
Charitable activities Not disclosed —

What changed in The Authors' Contingency Fund’s latest accounts?

Reported totals for 2025 compared with 2024. Changes can reflect the accounting period, restricted grants or restructuring as well as the charity’s work.

Income change
−58.7%
£118k → £49k
Spending change
−12.5%
£119k → £105k
Charitable activities share
Not disclosed
Both years need a disclosed spending split.

These are annual figures. The Clarity Score may use averages across several disclosed years. Source: official accounts.

Where does the money go?

Latest accounts (2025) · £105k spent. Not disclosed in this filing — the Charity Commission return omits the charitable-activities split.

From the annual return

What does The Authors' Contingency Fund pay its staff, and where does its money come from?

Answers The Authors' Contingency Fund gave in its annual return to the Charity Commission for the year ending 31 December 2025, plus its register entry. These are the charity's own disclosures, not part of the Clarity Score.

Can I claim Gift Aid, and are the trustees paid?

The register records The Authors' Contingency Fund 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. Work out your Gift Aid

The Authors' Contingency Fund's annual return for the year ending 31 December 2025 reports that one or more trustees received payments or other benefits (payments for providing services). Charity law allows this only in limited circumstances; the trustees' annual report should explain it.

Registration details

Registered as a charity
Where it says it operates
Throughout England and Wales

Source: Charity Commission register and annual return data, Open Government Licence v3.0. A blank answer in the return is shown as not reported, never as “no”.

How have The Authors' Contingency Fund's finances changed over five years?

Income fell 85% from £325k in 2021 to £49k in 2025; spending was £105k in 2025.

£0 £200k £400k £600k £800k 2021 2022 2023 2024 2025 Income 2021: £325k Spending 2021: £381k Income 2022: £507k Spending 2022: £302k Cause spend 2022: £300k Income 2023: £94k Spending 2023: £424k Income 2024: £118k Spending 2024: £119k Income 2025: £49k Spending 2025: £105k
  • Income
  • Spending
  • Cause spend
The Authors' Contingency Fund income and spending by accounts year
Year Income Spending Charitable activities
2025 £49k £105k Not disclosed
2024 £118k £119k Not disclosed
2023 £94k £424k Not disclosed
2022 £507k £302k £300k
2021 £325k £381k Not disclosed

Cause spend is plotted only when the filing discloses a split · Source: Charity Commission filings

How does The Authors' Contingency Fund compare?

The share of each group scoring at or below The Authors' Contingency Fund, including tied scores. A group matched on cause, income band and accounts year appears when at least ten records qualify. Broader groups below may mix reporting periods and operating models. Groups include this charity; percentiles measure our financial rating, not impact.

Same cause, income band and accounts year (2025) 5thpercentile

Scores at or above 5% of 66 charities with the same primary cause, income band and latest accounts year · 27/100 vs 52 peer average.

Income band (£100k–£500k) 3rdpercentile

Scores at or above 3% of 1,002 charities in its income band · 27/100 vs 52 peer average.

Arts & culture charities 0thpercentile

Scores at or above 0% of 617 charities in this cause · 27/100 vs 73 peer average.

How does The Authors' Contingency Fund compare, and where else can you look?

Compare The Authors' Contingency Fund with others More arts & culture charities How we score charities

Where The Authors' Contingency Fund sits

The causes this charity is classified under, and other charities working nearby.

Similar arts & culture charities

Top-rated peers by CharityCompare score

Evidence and interpretation

What the evidence says about The Authors' Contingency Fund

In 2025, reported income was £48,562 and expenditure was £104,542. Expenditure exceeded income by £55,980. This annual balance is not the charity’s available cash or unrestricted reserves.

More financial context

Income fell 58.7% compared with 2024. Read the accounts notes for restricted grants, legacies and one-off receipts before treating the movement as a trend.

A separate charitable-activities spending figure is not available for this year in our dataset. We cannot calculate an annual programme-spending share from these fields.

Calculated from our dated accounts dataset, refreshed 2026-09-06. This is not an audit or a manual review of every filing. Original register and accounts · How calculations work.

Find the right support

Who it supports and how to access its work

Reported beneficiaries: Other Defined Groups.

How it works: Makes Grants To Individuals.

Use the official contact details to check eligibility, referrals, waiting lists and current service coverage. Broad register classifications and a contact address do not confirm that a particular service is available to you.

Explore source-checked support routes

Classifications supplied to the register; extract 2026-10-04. Register contact and activity details · Website listed for this charity

Look beyond the score

Results and impact evidence

We have not added a source-checked programme outcome for this charity. That is a gap in this profile, not evidence that the charity has no impact. Its annual report may contain results that have not been assessed here.

Reported grants to institutions: £0 (2022-12-31). This is spending reported in the annual return, not a measure of beneficiary outcomes or an open grant opportunity. It may already be included in charitable expenditure. Check the source accounts.

What these results can tell you

Counts of services delivered describe activity. They do not by themselves establish lasting change, what would have happened without the programme, or cost-effectiveness. Results with different definitions, populations or years should not be ranked against each other.

How to judge charity impact evidence

What is The Authors' Contingency Fund's Beacon report?

Detailed accountability and finance metrics from UK regulator filings — structured for transparency in our four-beacon report.

Accountability & Transparency

Baseline trust from filing discipline, board oversight, and declared governance policies.

68/100

Accountability & Transparency metrics for The Authors' Contingency Fund
Metric Score Value
Filing history (5 years)

No recorded lateness in available history = 15 pts · one late filing = 5 pts · two or more or unknown status = 0 pts. Missing data is not proof of late filing.

 100% 15/15 pts
Trustee oversight

Three or more trustees on the register = 15 pts, scaled down for fewer (governance red flag below three).

 33% 1 trustee · 5/15 pts
Declared policies

Safeguarding (4) · conflict of interest (3) · volunteer management (3) — from Charity Commission annual return.

 70% 7/10 pts

Financial Health

Stability and solvency — reserves, revenue trend, and debt from Charity Commission accounts.

0/100

Financial Health metrics for The Authors' Contingency Fund
Metric Score Value
Reserves (months of expenditure)

3–24 months = full marks, tapering on both sides · 0 months or 4+ years = 0 pts. Reserves are not necessarily cash; needs vary by operating model.

 0% Not stated · 0/15 pts
Income stability / growth

+20% or more over the window = 10 pts · flat = 5 pts · −20% or worse = 0 pts, scaled between.

 0% 0/10 pts · 3-year average
Liabilities to assets

0% liabilities-to-assets = 5 pts, scaling down to 0 pts at 60%+ debt.

 0% Not stated · 0/5 pts

Financial Efficiency

How efficiently funds reach the cause — program spend and fundraising cost ratios.

0/100

Financial Efficiency metrics for The Authors' Contingency Fund
Metric Score Value
Program expense ratio

90%+ on charitable activities = full marks, scaling down to 0 pts at 50% or below.

 0% Not stated · 0/10 pts
Fundraising efficiency

≤10p to raise £1 = full marks, scaling down to 0 pts at 40p or above (fundraising cost ÷ income).

 0% Not stated · 0/10 pts

Community Support

Grassroots backing from Charity Commission workforce data — volunteers vs paid staff.

0/100

Community Support metrics for The Authors' Contingency Fund
Metric Score Value
Volunteer-to-staff ratio

Volunteers at 2x staff or more = full marks · no volunteers = 0 pts, scaled between.

 0% Not reported · 0/10 pts

How we calculate beacon scores →

What trust indicators does The Authors' Contingency Fund have?

Pulled from the Charity Commission register — filing behaviour, board size, and workforce where reported.

  • Accounts filed on time

    up to date · last filing

  • Trustee board size (3–12)

    1 trustees on the Charity Commission register

Fundraising Regulator

Status not yet checked

Separate from our financial scores. Registration records a commitment to the Code of Fundraising Practice; it does not certify every fundraising activity.

Check Fundraising Regulator →

Official register

Reg 212406

Full trustee list, accounts, and regulatory history on the Charity Commission.

View on Charity Commission →

Trustees & officers

  • The Society of Authors since 1963

How reliable is The Authors' Contingency Fund's data?

Source
Charity Commission (England & Wales)
Accounts year
2025
Filing date
Data refreshed

Medium confidence — some data missing or late

Scores reflect the accounts in our dated data extract. The live register may contain newer filings. Clarity Score measures how clearly the charity accounts for money in those filings — not programme impact.

Check the current register entry · Report a data correction

Financial source extract: 2026-09-06. Organisation identifier: 212406. Method version: 1.1. View method changes.

Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. Sources: Charity Commission for England and Wales, Office of the Scottish Charity Regulator and Charity Commission for Northern Ireland. Open Government Licence v3.0 .

Your donation decision

What should you check before donating to The Authors' Contingency Fund?

  1. 1. Match the name and charity number

    Check 212406 on the official register. A real charity number alone does not prove that a fundraiser or appeal is authentic.

    Verify the registration →

  2. 2. Read the accounts in context

    Our latest accounts data covers 2025. Compare the accounts period, spending and reserves. An administration cost ratio alone cannot tell you how effective a charity is.

    Explore the financial evidence →

  3. 3. Look for evidence of results

    Read the trustees’ annual report for activities, outcomes and limitations. The Clarity Score measures public reporting; it does not establish the impact of a donation.

    How to read charity accounts →

  4. 4. Compare charities serving your cause

    Compare up to four charities, check the dates behind their figures, and decide which work you want to support. Complete your donation through a verified charity channel.

    Start a comparison with The Authors' Contingency Fund →
How we score charities +

The Clarity Score is a 100-point rating from UK regulator filings (Charity Commission for England and Wales, OSCR and CCNI). Four pillars — Accountability & Transparency (40), Financial Health (30), Financial Efficiency (20), and Community Support (10) — each scored on a continuous scale, not pass/fail cutoffs. A statutory inquiry sets the score to 0 automatically.

Full methodology →

Accountability & Transparency

Scored from filings

40 points — filing history (15), trustee oversight (15, scaling up to a board of three or more), declared policies (10).

Financial Health

Scored from filings

30 points — reserves (15, full marks 3–24 months, tapering on both sides), income stability (10), liabilities to assets (5, scaling down as debt rises).

Financial Efficiency

Scored from filings

20 points — program expense ratio and fundraising cost, each on a graduated scale (not a single cutoff). Kept at 20% of the total: financial-ratio scoring alone is not a reliable effectiveness signal (see "why not just an overhead ratio?" below).

Community Support

Scored from filings

10 points — volunteer-to-staff ratio from Charity Commission workforce data, scaling continuously up to a 2:1 ratio.

Overall score

Sum of all pillar points. Display stars use the same bands as the labels: 90–100 → 5★ Exceptional; 75–89 → 4★ Good; 60–74 → 3★ Needs improvement; 1–59 → 2★ Poor; 0 → not rated.

How can you share The Authors' Contingency Fund's rating?

Share: XLinkedInFacebookBluesky

Opens a printer-friendly view of this profile for The Authors' Contingency Fund.

For this charity

How do you add The Authors' Contingency Fund's rating to your site?

Free to use — a lightweight HTML badge or an embeddable score widget, each linking back to this independent profile and our methodology.

What red flags does The Authors' Contingency Fund have?

Frequently asked questions

Common questions about The Authors' Contingency Fund's rating, finances, and Charity Commission status.

Is The Authors' Contingency Fund a good charity? +

The Authors' Contingency Fund scores 27 out of 100 (2 stars — Poor) on CharityCompare's Clarity Score, our independent read of its UK regulator filings. Its recent filings do not disclose a charitable-activities spend split and its accounts are up to date. 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 The Authors' Contingency Fund a legitimate charity? +

The register data used for this profile lists The Authors' Contingency Fund as a registered charity (charity number 212406). Verify it on the official register: https://register-of-charities.charitycommission.gov.uk/charity-details/?regId=212406&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 The Authors' Contingency Fund's charity number? +

The Authors' Contingency Fund's charity number is 212406. 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 The Authors' Contingency Fund's charity rating? +

The Authors' Contingency Fund scores 27 out of 100 on CharityCompare (2 stars — Poor). 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 The Authors' Contingency Fund have reviews and complaints? +

CharityCompare does not host public user reviews for The Authors' Contingency Fund. Instead you get a filing-based Clarity Score, cause spend, reserves and red flags such as late accounts (2 red flags on this profile: insufficient trustee oversight; sharp income decline). For formal complaints about a charity, contact the Charity Commission, OSCR, CCNI or the Fundraising Regulator as appropriate.

How much of my donation reaches The Authors' Contingency Fund? +

The Authors' Contingency Fund does not disclose a charitable-activities spend split in its recent UK regulator filings, so there is no official figure for how much of a donation reaches the cause. CharityCompare reports this as "not disclosed" rather than assuming a number.

What are The Authors' Contingency Fund's overheads? +

The Authors' Contingency Fund's recent UK regulator filings do not disclose a fundraising or governance cost split, so no official overhead percentage is available. The register does not show individual salaries; senior pay is disclosed in the trustees' annual report and accounts.

How much income does The Authors' Contingency Fund receive? +

The Authors' Contingency Fund reported £49k total income in its 2025 accounts, based on UK regulator filings. Five-year trend: check comparability.

Are The Authors' Contingency Fund's accounts up to date? +

Filing status: up to date (last filing 2026-08-12). CharityCompare flags late or missing accounts separately from the financial score.

Where is The Authors' Contingency Fund based? +

The Authors' Contingency Fund's registered contact address is in London (WC1R 4EH). It tells the regulator it operates in England and Wales, with a focus on arts & culture.

Can I claim Gift Aid on a donation to The Authors' Contingency Fund? +

The register records The Authors' Contingency Fund 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 The Authors' Contingency Fund's trustees paid? +

The Authors' Contingency Fund's annual return for the year ending 31 December 2025 reports that one or more trustees received payments or other benefits (payments for providing services). Charity law allows this only in limited circumstances; the trustees' annual report should explain it.

When was The Authors' Contingency Fund registered as a charity? +

The Authors' Contingency Fund was entered on the register on 16 January 1963.

How does CharityCompare score The Authors' Contingency Fund? +

We calculate a Clarity Score of 0–100 from four pillars in The Authors' Contingency Fund'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 The Authors' Contingency Fund'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.