Welcome to the Hospice and Care Benchmarking Survey Report for 2020/2021.
The Hospice and Care Benchmarking Survey Report is the fourth study compiled by Haysmacintyre LLP (haysmacintyre) and Hempsons Solicitors, with the aim of sharing best practice in the sector and enabling management and trustees to assess their own structure, governance and monitoring procedures against other comparable charities.
The survey was constructed to offer a broad range of benchmarks and our thanks goes to those that participated in the study for their insights in producing this report, which we hope you find both useful, and informative.
We expanded the survey this time around to capture additional information on training provided to trustees, how risk registers and reserves policies have been adapted in response to the pandemic, what information is provided in management accounts to trustees, and to explore if there have been any changes experienced in discussions with funders.
There are areas of the survey which show that the sector continues to adopt best practice and common principles. Governance structures remain consistent with the use of subsidiaries for trading or retail operations. There is a commonality in the risks identified within the wider sector and unsurprisingly, income generation remains the highest risk on all respondents’ agendas.
COVID-19 continues to have a significant impact upon the sector, as demonstrated with 32% of respondents now including the pandemic as a key risk to the charity on their risk registers. The implications for all charities have seen revised strategy documents produced and a review of reserves policies to ensure they are still appropriate. The care sector in particular has seen very different challenges but continues to operate and provide care in difficult circumstances. Many in this survey are charities that rely heavily on fundraising income to support their charitable activities. The coming months will be a real test of both the resilience of the sector and the loyalty of those who are able to continue to support charities, as we continue to emerge from the various restrictions imposed by the Government in response to the pandemic.
