Notes for churchwardens, treasurers and others helping run the parish income survey.

Who are these notes for?

Whoever is co-ordinating the survey. This is likely to be churchwardens and the deanery treasurer but it is quite possible for the churchwardens or PCC and deanery synod to appoint others to carry out the specific tasks of the survey in order to share the work.

Making the decision about what unit to work with

The basic unit for this exercise is the parish but each PCC has the freedom to decide to conduct it by DCC, or in conjunction with neighbouring parishes, particularly where the payment of Parish Share is undertaken at this different level. These decisions are best taken in conversation with deanery officers.

Compiling the list of “Active Members”

The creation of a list of “Active Members” is recognition that Average Sunday Attendance (ASA) is an imperfect measure of who is engaged with and committed to the church. In some places the two will be very closely aligned, in others the difference may be significant. It is not the aim to list every person who ever has something to do with the church but to include everyone who is sufficiently committed that they could reasonably be approach to offer regular financial support.

In consultation with the clergy and others, churchwardens are asked to draw up a list of those who could fairly be described as active members, using their own knowledge of the people and the parish.

To maximise the consistency between parishes, and thus the equality of the scheme, we need to try and utilise common guidelines. Please consider the following carefully as you compile your list:

  • Anyone who is a regular planned giver who at least occasionally worships with you should be included, even if their gift is annual.
  • Anyone who is a regular, although not necessarily frequent, attender of services other than major festivals. This should include anyone who attends at least 12 times per year, excluding Christmas, Easter and Remembrance. Where services are held less than weekly, include anyone who comes to at least one third of non-festival services.
  • Include other members of the Electoral Role who are known to consider themselves to be ‘active members’ who you would include in fundraising or stewardship appeals.
  • Ensure the ratio between Average Sunday Attendance (ASA) and ‘Active Membership’ is a fair reflection of the nature of your church. Where AM / ASA is less than 1.0 this suggests a regular number of ‘visitors’ whilst a ratio greater than 1.0 suggests that people are sometimes or often ‘missing’ on Sundays. Look for a ratio between Active Members and Average Sunday Attendance AM/ASA between 0.95 and 1.25

Take care to not include:

  • Anyone who will be participating in the survey elsewhere – Those who do wish to be included in more than one church survey can either tick the box to say that their income has been declared elsewhere or split their income between churches. Nobody should declare the same income twice.
  • Anyone who you know will be leaving the church in the next year
  • “Friends” who give money for the building or supports appeals, but are not otherwise not involved in the life of the church

The Distribution

Once an active membership list has been compiled, those on it need to be given:

  • The churchwardens’ letter asking them to take part
  • The colour leaflets explaining both parish share and this system
  • The survey participation form
  • The confidential income declaration form.

The churchwardens’ letter

Before printing you will need to put in

  • the name of your parish
  • the date it is being sent out
  • the appropriate signatures. Where there are two churchwardens, it is best if this signed by both churchwardens acting together, and this is what the template assumes.

The Survey Form and Confidential Income Declaration Form

For each of these, you will need to

  • change the name of the parish in the title and in the text.
  • print the survey form and the confidential income assessment form on different coloured paper
  • prepare two boxes for collecting the forms, the same colours as the forms.
  • change the wording in both the declaration and note 1, to include the colours. For example, Note 1 becomes ‘Please place this form in the sealed blue box in Church marked INCOME.’

The Churchwardens’ and Deanery Treasurer’s Assessment Form

Notes to Part 1

1.The churchwardens of the parish which has issued the income assessment forms need to record the number on their agreed active membership list, and the number of the survey participation forms returned.

2.They need to sign part 1 and pass it on, together with the sealed box of income declaration forms, to the churchwardens of the recording parish by the deanery’s agreed date.

Notes to Part 2

1.The recording churchwardens need to count the number of income forms received, compare it with the number given by the churchwardens of the issuing parish, and try to reconcile any discrepancy. (An invalid form is one where there is either no income declaration, or the declaration is unclear.)

2.They then need to enter the number of valid forms received against the appropriate Income Category and multiply by the Weighting Factor to calculate the parish points.

3.Each income band carries a weighting factor which is the mid-point of the range. The weighting factor represents a number of parish points: e.g. Band D £10,001 to £15,000 (mid-point £12,500) represents 12.5 points, or again Band K £60,001 to £70,000 represents 65 points.

4.If all Income Forms are returned the Grand Total will be as the Sub Total.

5.For missing Income Forms adjustments are made in Part 3 of the Assessment Form by the Deanery Treasurer.

6.The recording churchwardens then need to enter the subtotals, certify the form and send it to the deanery treasurer by (agreed date).

Notes to Part 3

The treasurer needs to calculate a value for each missing form, as follows.

  1. If 75% or more forms returned then the treasurer calculates and uses the points average for the parish for each missing form, using Table A.
  2. If fewer than 75% of the forms are returned, the treasurer calculates how many additional forms are needed to reach 75%. Then for each missing form, the treasurer calculates them on the basis of the deanery HMRC average. The average is assigned to the appropriate income band and parish points are calculated as for an actual declaration. Then the treasurer calculates the remaining 25% using this average as the figure. In this case, Table B is completed. (see page 4 below)
  3. If a parish has not carried out the income survey at all, then Table C is used. Each member of the parish is assessed as if their income was the deanery HMRC average, converted into parish points as above.
  4. If such a parish has created an “active membership” list, the numbers of that list should be used to calculate their total parish points.
  5. Where a parish has not created an “active membership” list as part of this exercise, use the mean average of their ASA and Electoral Roll numbers. The diocesan office will give you these numbers for each parish in your deanery.

The deanery treasurer returns a copy of this form for each parish in the deanery to the diocesan office.

Some Additional Questions and Answers

What is the timescale on which this is operating?

We ask parishes to complete this so that deanery treasurers can return the forms to Stephen Lindner and the finance department by the end of June. This means that there will be sufficient time to work with the returned figures so that the Bishops' Council can consider and, if needs be, offer options for transitional arrangements to the Diocesan Synod for a decision in the autumn.

Our parish would like an extension to the deadline, can we have one?

The calculation of Parish Share cannot be made for anyone until forms have been received from everyone. It is therefore really important that the deadline is observed. If there is a reason why a parish is unable to meet the deadline, this should in the first instance be discussed with deanery treasurer. If the difficulty still can’t be resolved, the treasurer is asked to inform Stephen Lindner. In the event of the results not being received in time, it will be necessary to use a figure based on the HMRC data.

What happens if the figures are disputed?

In the first place questions and disputes should be referred to the deanery standing committee. If they can’t resolve the issue, it should be referred jointly to the archdeacon and diocesan secretary for advice.

Can we still make deanery adjustments?

Parish Share allocation is made directly to parishes or districts but the deanery synod may wish to explore mutually agreed adjustments as a way of supporting parishes in the light of local issues in order to share in bearing one another’s burdens. Any such adjustments (whether up or down) would need the support of all the respective PCCs. It is unlikely that the shared aim of reducing the overall shortfall in Parish Share collection will be met without this sort of local cooperation.

What should people on varying income do?

The situations of people who are self-employed, on zero-hours contracts or involved in occasional or seasonal work, vary tremendously. We therefore offer these suggestions for guidance, while recognising that people will have to use their own best judgement. For example, it may be possible for someone to average their income, less tax over a three year period. This would be particularly helpful for someone with very erratic earnings where they honestly don’t know what would happen in the future. In other cases it may be that someone has had variable earnings in the last three years but always with a reducing income, year on year. In this scenario it might be fairer to only use the lowest of the last three years’ figures i.e. the immediately preceding year. Respecting the confidentiality of the process means that we can offer guidelines, but only the person concerned can decide which box on the declaration form would be the most accurate to tick.

How should the list of ‘Active Members’ be compiled?

Your list of ‘active members’ is likely to include most, but not all of the people on the electoral roll, the planned giving and gift aid registers, mailing lists held for church magazines and events, church rotas etc. so all of these will act as useful aides-memoires for the churchwardens and clergy to think about who might properly be considered as an active member. It is important to include people who know the people of the parish well in putting the list together, particularly where the clergy and or the wardens are relatively new.

It will be highly unlikely that the active membership and the electoral roll would end up being identical; no-one is recommending that you should use the electoral roll as a mailing-list for this exercise.

The parish Gift Aid officer might be one person the churchwardens would wish to consult about the draft list as someone with a good knowledge of regular givers. Equally, if the gift aid officer, clergy or wardens, knows of people who never attend church, but just want to contribute to the upkeep and heritage of the building, then such a person probablyshouldn’t be included as an active church member anyway, although that has to remain a local decision based on local knowledge.

Keep in mind that the aim of the survey is to include people who might reasonably be encouraged to be a regular financial contributor, however small, to the ongoing life and work of the church.

How long should the information be kept, and by whom?

Both the survey forms and the confidential income declaration forms (which remain the property of the PCC on whose behalf they were collected) need to be retained until after the parish share allocation has been notified to all parishes, in case there is any query about the allocation. The survey participation forms need to be kept by the parish whose forms they are, and the confidential income declaration forms need to be kept by the recording parish, so that at no stage can the two forms be linked. Each parish should destroy the forms it holds three months after the parish share allocation has been notified, unless that parish is involved in an ongoing query, in which case they should be destroyed as soon as the query is resolved.

What about the new General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR)?

With regard to data protection and the move to GDPR in May 2018, ‘church management’ is covered by Section 9(2)d which outlines special permission for religious (and other) bodies. This covers the collection and use of data for internal purposes. The completion of an electoral roll application form provides consent for the individual to be added to the roll, and for their information to be used for the purposes of the roll. However, that consent does not extend to the use of that data for other purposes or passing it to other organisations. The church may therefore construct a list of an active worshipping community and use the electoral roll data to inform that, but not to pass the list to an external organisation without explicit consent. There is however no issue with passing a figure representingthe total number of people on that list to the diocese. The Income Survey does not carry personal data and can therefore be passed on without difficulty.

Do all dioceses of the Church of England use this approach to calculating Parish Share?

Each diocese has its own way of managing Parish Share. These range from dioceses who rely entirely on an offer based system to those who request payment for the direct costs of the ministry in each parish, with most using some calculation based on measures of ability to pay. The National Stewardship Advisor said of, what he described as the Church family anonymous income survey: “This is probably the most accurate evaluation of the wealth, and therefore potential to give, that is present within a church.” A system of sharing the costs of being a diocese between all of the churches in the diocese on the basis of the actual incomes of the actual people in the churches has been selected by the Worcester Diocesan Synod as the fairest approach to allocating the costs.