Registered Charities
Updated December 2009
You can apply to register under the Charities Act (with Charities Services) at any time.
However, you should apply as soon as possible if you are seeking charitable tax status, or if you wish to have your organisation's details publicly available on the Charities Register.
On this page:
The Charities Register opened on 1 February 2007. Registration as a charity is voluntary and applications can be made at anytime, online or on paper forms.
You can decide the best time for your organisation to apply. However, you should apply as soon as possible if you are seeking charitable tax status or if you wish to have your organisation's details publicly available on the Charities Register.
If you are setting up a new organisation as a legal entity – for example, if you intend to register your organisation with the Companies Office under the Charitable Trusts Act 1957, the Incorporated Societies Act 1908 or the Companies Act 1993 you should do this before you apply to us. See our information sheet How the Charities Act affects charitable trusts, incorporated societies and companies for more details.
The tax laws relating to charities changed on 1 July 2008. Since that date, charities must be registered with us, Charities Services, to be eligible for tax exemptions on the grounds of charitable purpose.
This means that if your charity was tax exempt on the basis of charitable purpose before 1 July 2008, that exemption no longer exists and you need to be registered with us to be eligible for charitable tax exemptions.
Registered charities don't have to pay income tax (including resident withholding tax), and donors of gifts to registered charities don't have to pay gift duty. The changes do not affect donee status.
See our information sheet Tax – how the Charities Act affects your tax status for more details.
The time it takes to process applications varies, but most complete applications are processed within 35 working days. (If an application is incomplete, it will take additional time while we request and wait for the missing information). From time to time, there may be a queue of applications, which may also add to the processing time. Applications are processed in the order they are received, as they come to the front of the queue. For information about processing queues, please refer to the FAQs on our website.
We contact applicants as soon as we have processed their applications – either to ask for more information, or to let them know that their organisation has been registered.
Occasionally, an application can raise issues that we need to talk through with the applicant. This additional correspondence may add to the processing time.
NOTE: It is helpful if you include a letter with your application, briefly explaining your charity’s activities (or give us a copy of your brochure, or a link to your website), so we are easily able to see if all your activities are, in fact, charitable. If we have this information provided with your application, it can help us to more quickly process the application once it reaches the front of the queue.
The Charities Act allows us to backdate registration. However, the effective registration date cannot be earlier than the date we received a properly completed application.
No. All applications are considered in the order we receive them and are subject to the same rigorous examination process. One application cannot be fast-tracked ahead of others as this would be unfair to other applicants.
Applying to register a group under the Charities Act is a two-stage process and the time it takes to process group applications depends on the complexity of the specific application. If your organisation is considering a group application, please ask us for a Group Registration Information Pack.
The Charities Act requires all charities registered with us to send an Annual Return to Charities Services no later than six months after their balance date.
While each case must be considered individually, there may be grounds for exempting charities from filing Annual Returns that would cover a substantial period of time prior to registration. See our information sheet Annual Returns under the Charities Act for more details about filing Annual Returns.
Please note that incorporated societies who are registered with us do not need to send an annual financial statement to the Companies Office. They only need to send an Annual Return to us.
If you make changes, for example to your address, rules or officers, while we are still processing your application email info@charities.govt.nz to let us know.
If you make changes, for example to your address, rules or officers, after you have been registered, use Form 3 or Form 4 to notify us of the changes. Our information sheet What to do when something about your charity changes has more details.
Timing it right: When to apply for registration under the Charities Act
The information on this webpage is available in PDF format for you to view, download, or print.