Common questions about The City and Guilds of London Institute's rating, finances, and Charity Commission status.
Is The City and Guilds of London Institute a good charity? +
The City and Guilds of London Institute scores 65 out of 100 (3 stars — Needs improvement) on CharityCompare's Clarity Score, our independent read of its UK regulator filings. Around 61% of its spending goes to charitable activities (3-yr avg) 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 City and Guilds of London Institute a legitimate charity? +
The register data used for this profile lists The City and Guilds of London Institute as a registered charity (charity number 312832). Verify it on the official register: https://register-of-charities.charitycommission.gov.uk/charity-details/?regId=312832&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 City and Guilds of London Institute's charity number? +
The City and Guilds of London Institute's charity number is 312832. 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 City and Guilds of London Institute's charity rating? +
The City and Guilds of London Institute scores 65 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 The City and Guilds of London Institute have reviews and complaints? +
CharityCompare does not host public user reviews for The City and Guilds of London Institute. Instead you get a filing-based Clarity Score, cause spend, reserves and red flags such as late accounts (2 red flags on this profile: regulator published report; 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 The City and Guilds of London Institute? +
Across the recent disclosed accounts used for this score, 61% of The City and Guilds of London Institute'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 The City and Guilds of London Institute's overheads? +
Across the recent disclosed accounts used for this score, fundraising costs were about 38% of total expenditure and fundraising plus separately reported governance figures amount to about 39% of expenditure (2023–2025, disclosed years); these categories can overlap, so this is not a distinct total of all administration costs at The City and Guilds of London Institute. The City and Guilds of London Institute's annual return for the year ending 31 August 2025 reports 319 employees paid more than £60,000, including 55 employees paid more than £100,000. The highest reported pay band is over £500,000 (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 The City and Guilds of London Institute receive? +
The City and Guilds of London Institute reported £175m total income in its 2025 accounts, based on UK regulator filings. Five-year trend: growing.
Are The City and Guilds of London Institute's accounts up to date? +
Filing status: up to date (last filing 2026-06-09). CharityCompare flags late or missing accounts separately from the financial score.
Where is The City and Guilds of London Institute based? +
The City and Guilds of London Institute's registered contact address is in London (EC1A 9DE). It tells the regulator it operates in South Africa, Sri Lanka, Sudan, Eswatini, Sweden, Tanzania, with a focus on education.
How much is The City and Guilds of London Institute's chief executive paid? +
The Charity Commission register does not name individual salaries. The City and Guilds of London Institute's annual return for the year ending 31 August 2025 reports 319 employees paid more than £60,000, including 55 employees paid more than £100,000. The highest reported pay band is over £500,000 (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 The City and Guilds of London Institute's money come from? +
The City and Guilds of London Institute reported £175m total income for the year ending 31 August 2025. The largest sources were charitable activities £113m (64%), trading and fundraising events £62m (35%), investments £600k (0%).
Can I claim Gift Aid on a donation to The City and Guilds of London Institute? +
The register does not record The City and Guilds of London Institute as registered with HMRC for Gift Aid. Ask the charity before assuming a donation can be Gift Aided.
Are The City and Guilds of London Institute's trustees paid? +
The City and Guilds of London Institute's annual return for the year ending 31 August 2025 reports that no trustee received remuneration or other benefits from the charity.
What was The City and Guilds of London Institute previously called? +
The register lists these previous names for The City and Guilds of London Institute: City & Guilds; City and Guilds of London Institute.
When was The City and Guilds of London Institute registered as a charity? +
The City and Guilds of London Institute was entered on the register on 25 May 1965.
How does CharityCompare score The City and Guilds of London Institute? +
We calculate a Clarity Score of 0–100 from four pillars in The City and Guilds of London Institute'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 City and Guilds of London Institute'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.