Common questions about The Royal British Legion's rating, finances, and Charity Commission status.
Is The Royal British Legion a good charity? +
The Royal British Legion scores 87 out of 100 (4 stars — Good) on CharityCompare's Clarity Score, our independent read of its UK regulator filings. Around 73% 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 Royal British Legion a legitimate charity? +
The register data used for this profile lists The Royal British Legion as a registered charity (charity number 219279). Verify it on the official register: https://register-of-charities.charitycommission.gov.uk/charity-details/?regId=219279&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 Royal British Legion's charity number? +
The Royal British Legion's charity number is 219279. 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 Royal British Legion's charity rating? +
The Royal British Legion scores 87 out of 100 on CharityCompare (4 stars — Good). 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 Royal British Legion have reviews and complaints? +
CharityCompare does not host public user reviews for The Royal British Legion. Instead you get a filing-based Clarity Score, cause spend, reserves and red flags such as late accounts (one red flag on this profile: 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 Royal British Legion? +
Across the recent disclosed accounts used for this score, 73% of The Royal British Legion'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 Royal British Legion's overheads? +
Across the recent disclosed accounts used for this score, fundraising costs were about 27% of total expenditure and fundraising plus separately reported governance figures amount to about 27% of expenditure (2023–2025, disclosed years); these categories can overlap, so this is not a distinct total of all administration costs at The Royal British Legion. The Royal British Legion's annual return for the year ending 30 September 2025 reports 77 employees paid more than £60,000, including 9 employees paid more than £100,000. The highest reported pay band is £150,001–£200,000 (3 employees). Individual salaries, including the chief executive's, are disclosed in the trustees' annual report rather than on the register.
How much income does The Royal British Legion receive? +
The Royal British Legion reported £168m total income in its 2025 accounts, based on UK regulator filings. Five-year trend: growing.
Are The Royal British Legion's accounts up to date? +
Filing status: up to date (last filing 2026-07-06). CharityCompare flags late or missing accounts separately from the financial score.
Where is The Royal British Legion based? +
The Royal British Legion's registered contact address is in London (SE1 1AA). It tells the regulator it operates in England and Wales, Scotland, Northern Ireland, Belgium, Belize, Brazil, with a focus on armed forces.
How much is The Royal British Legion's chief executive paid? +
The Charity Commission register does not name individual salaries. The Royal British Legion's annual return for the year ending 30 September 2025 reports 77 employees paid more than £60,000, including 9 employees paid more than £100,000. The highest reported pay band is £150,001–£200,000 (3 employees). 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 Royal British Legion's money come from? +
The Royal British Legion reported £168m total income for the year ending 30 September 2025. The largest sources were donations and legacies £95m (57%), charitable activities £39m (23%), trading and fundraising events £24m (15%). Legacies (gifts in wills) contributed £25m.
Can I claim Gift Aid on a donation to The Royal British Legion? +
The register records The Royal British Legion 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 Royal British Legion's trustees paid? +
The Royal British Legion's annual return for the year ending 30 September 2025 reports that no trustee received remuneration or other benefits from the charity.
What was The Royal British Legion previously called? +
The register lists these previous names for The Royal British Legion: British Legion; The Royal British Legion (Corporate Body).
When was The Royal British Legion registered as a charity? +
The Royal British Legion was entered on the register on 10 July 1977.
How does CharityCompare score The Royal British Legion? +
We calculate a Clarity Score of 0–100 from four pillars in The Royal British Legion'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 Royal British Legion'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.