Why we're changing our fees

On 1 July 2019, we’ll be making some changes to our fees.

For most Stewardship account holders, our fees will remain the same.

We know that, as a Stewardship account holder, you'll want to know if your giving will be affected, so we've written this post to provide you with all the information you need. We've divided it into the following sections:

1. What is a Stewardship fee?

2. Why are you making changes to your fees?

3. What are the changes?

4. How will the changes affect me?

5. What do I need to do next?

6. How will this affect my recipients?

7. Can I still take advantage of the fee cap before 1 July 2019?

8. How often will your fees change in the future?

1. What is a Stewardship fee?

It's completely free to open a Stewardship Giving Account or Donor Advised Fund and we do not apply any monthly service charges. For these accounts we make a deduction based on the value of any gift you make into your account (plus Gift Aid where applicable). For an overview of our fees, please take a look at our Fees.

2. Why are you making changes to your fees?

We’ve got many exciting changes happening here at Stewardship. We’ll be launching some new services soon as well as continuing to make updates and improvements to what we currently offer. In anticipation of these changes, we’re making a few updates to our fees to better reflect our full range of services, and simplify our pricing going forward.

When considering changes to our prices we sought to be fair and equitable.

For giving account* holders:

• • • Standardising our fee

We're standardising our fee deduction to be 3% across all giving accounts, whether funded with Gift Aid or without, to ensure we offer a consistent service and in order to better reflect the true cost to maintain our quality of service, investments in security and technology, and our high standards of due diligence.

For Donor Advised Fund holders:

• • Reducing the standard fee
  • We recognise that the Donor Advised Fund service is funded through a combination of fees and interest earned on the collective balances held in these funds, so wanted to reflect that in our changes. We're reducing the standard fee on incoming gifts from 3% to 2%.

Cap removal for one-off gifts

We charge a low percentage on incoming gifts which, historically, has been capped for larger gifts. These caps were set over 10 years ago; and have not kept up with either giving or cost trends. Increasingly our givers fund their accounts with larger lump sums that they then donate over many months and years; so increasingly the cost of servicing is much higher than the capped charge.

Further these historic caps were set at a level that no longer allows us to maintain the quality of service, investments in security and technology, or our comprehensive due diligence processes.

Instead of caps we now offer three levels of account, each designed to be suitable and economic depending on the level of giving required. These new prices are bench-marked and are very competitive with other comparable suppliers in each category.

We believe these fee changes are necessary to ensure growth, improvement and sustainability of our service, to better work towards our mission and vision and to ensure that we continue providing you with an excellent service.

3. What are the changes?

For giving account holders:

• We’re removing our cap on fees
  
  We're removing our fee cap of £400 for a one-off gift and our annual fee cap of £1300 for regular gifts.
• We're standardising our fees
  
  For gifts where Gift Aid is not added, there will be an increase in our standard fee deduction from 2% to 3%. This fee change will also apply to the Corporate Giving Account and Church/Charity Giving Account. Where Gift Aid is added, our standard fee remains unchanged.

For Donor Advised Fund holders:

• We’re reducing our standard fee for the Donor Advised Fund
  
  We’re reducing our standard fee from 3% to 2%. The change applies for gifts where Gift Aid is added. Where Gift Aid is not added, our fee remains unchanged.
• We’re changing our cap on one-off gift fees
  
  We’re removing our fee cap of £400 for one-off gifts made into your account.
• We're adjusting our annual fee cap
  
  We will cap the fees charged on any incoming gifts in excess of £250,000 annually, whether one-off or regular, for Donor Advised Funds.

Applicable to all account holders:

• We’re simplifying our fees when donating to international recipients
  
  We’re simplifying our international fees so that where a request is made for a donation to a church or charity registered overseas, a simple additional deduction of 1% will apply. Please note that a one-off set-up fee may also apply.

4. How will the fee changes affect me?

For giving account and Donor Advised Fund holders:

Changing our cap on fees:

• An account holder who makes a regular gift of less than £2,777 per month is unlikely to be affected by the changes.
• An account holder who makes a regular gift of more than £2,777 per month may experience a slight increase in fees now that the annual cap has been removed (or adjusted for Donor Advised Funds).
• If you make a one-off gift of more than £13,333 after 1 July 2019, our fee will no longer be capped at £400. Those who have made gifts at this level in the past have been contacted by our team to ensure these new charges are understood and to discuss the appropriate levels of service going forward. If you plan on giving at this level or above please contact our team for a consultation.

5. What do I need to do next?

You do not need to do anything - we will be contacting anyone who we believe will be significantly impacted by the changes that we are making to ensure that their giving arrangements are adjusted appropriately. If you have any questions or comments about your account, we would love to hear from you. Please get in touch with our team by emailing us here.

6. How will this affect my recipients?

The vast majority of recipients will be unaffected by this change. In a small number of cases (for example, where our corporate fee is increasing from 2% to 3%) where the amount a recipient receives is directly linked to an incoming gift, there may be a slight reduction in a grant payment.

7. Can I still take advantage of the fee cap before 1 July 2019?

Yes - we have deliberately notified all account holders of the change at least 60 days before they take effect to ensure that those already planning a large gift into their account can have access to the current fee.

8. How often will your fees change in future?

We review fees on an annual basis and, in some cases, make some minor adjustments in line with inflation or other contributing factors.

See also:

Stewardship Pricing 2019

What we do for our fee and how we compare

*Giving account refers to: Stewardship Giving Account, 18-25 Giving Account, Corporate Giving Account, Church/Charity Giving Account.