FAQs

All our open grant schemes  listed on our How to Apply page.

This is also where you can find our General Guidance for Applicants and grant specific eligibility and criteria that will help you decide which is the best option for your organisation and your work.

In principle, yes, but with limited funds we would like to spread our funding as far and wide across Devon as possible so that we can support as many people and communities as we can.

We would ask that you think carefully about what funding your organisation needs and only apply for a grant where your activity clearly fits with the specific criteria for that grant scheme.

If you do decide to apply for more than one grant at any one time, this should not be for the same activity. Please also bear in mind that our decision-making panels will take the number of applications you have in progress into consideration when deciding which applications to fund.

Applicants should read the General Guidance for Applicants document that outlines what to do before applying for a grant. This will help to ensure that your application is not rejected because it is not eligible, or you do not have the required documents.

When ready to make an application, you will need to access the online application form that is relevant to the grant that you are applying for, and which will be available on our website.

Devon Community Foundation aims to be as inclusive and accessible as possible. For this reason, if using our online application form creates a barrier to access for applying for funding, we will happily discuss an alternative option with you.

If you would like to discuss this with us, please email grants@devoncf.com or call 01884 235887. 

As a rule, if you have completed your funded activity, you are welcome to apply to us again providing that you have completed a satisfactory end of grant evaluation to let us know what difference the funding made, and we have no concerns about your grant spend. We may not consider an application if there is an outstanding end of grant evaluation or we have concerns about any grant spend. Where there are concerns, we will be in touch with you to discuss any issues. 

If your organisation currently holds a grant with us and this is the first funding you have received from DCF, we will only award a subsequent grant once we have received a satisfactory end of grant evaluation for your current grant. This is so that we can be sure that the initial grant that we awarded was used for the intended purpose and in line with our Terms and Conditions.

We launch new grant opportunities throughout the year that have their own specific criteria and recommend that you always read these in detail prior to applying. It may be possible to apply for one of these grants whilst you are working on another grant funded project if the activity described is different and we can see no duplication.

Yes, as long as you have provided a satisfactory end of grant evaluation and met the conditions of your grant. It is common for organisations to apply to us for repeat funding, but we do look for evidence of ongoing learning and evaluation within your reporting. Our funding is limited and, in cases where we may receive a high volume of applications, we will prioritise applications using the priorities outlined within the criteria for that grant scheme.

If we have funded your work repeatedly for a while or you are submitting your third consecutive Community Grant application, we may get in touch to help you identify alternative sources of funding.

Please refer to the specific criteria for the grant that you are interested in.

Whilst we aim to publish any deadlines for funding on our website, we do occasionally need to close an application round early if we spend the funding sooner than anticipated. We will always make it clear in the guidance notes if this could be a possibility. We will closely monitor the amount of funding available and publicise through our website and social media when we will be closing for applications. At this point, we will contact all organisations that have an application in progress, including those who have registered for a grant, to notify them that it is closing and provide time for the application to be completed and submitted for consideration. 

No, not if you are able to tell us what you would like us to know in fewer words.

It’s important that we gain as much detail and understanding as we can about what you would like to do, and our grant application forms reflect the scale of detail we look for. Please do not view the word count as a target to meet. We hope that by using it as a guide you understand the level of detail we would like and have enough space to tell us all we need so that we do not have to contact you for further information. We review our word count limits regularly to ensure that they allow applicants to provide enough information for us to fully assess the application.

We want organisations to let us know what funding they need in order to be able to continue providing support to communities across Devon. For this reason, our Community Grants criteria are deliberately open.

We publish specific guidance for all our grant schemes. It is important that you read these to understand where they differ from our standard guidance, including details of what we will and won’t fund. In all cases, it is important that you provide us with a detailed budget and description of activity and the difference you aim to make so that we can understand as fully as possible how our funding will be used.

This may vary from grant to grant. Please refer to our General Guidance for Applicants document and read in conjunction with our specific grant guidance documents to understand what we will not support.

This will vary, depending on what grant you are applying for.

Please refer to the specific guidance for the grant for which you are applying.

As a rule, our priority for our funding is on small, local organisations supporting communities across Devon with priority given to organisations with an income below £500,000. However, larger organisations are welcome to apply for a grant, subject to eligibility criteria for that grant, but will need to demonstrate how the funding will add value to existing work and why they need funding from Devon Community Foundation for it. 

It is good practice for organisations to manage their finances to meet short terms needs and plan for future expenses and investment. We are happy to consider applications where designated funds are being set aside for something specific and ask that information about any such funds be included in the application to explain the figures presented and aid the assessment. If you are unsure if you are eligible please get in touch.

Provided the funding that you are looking for meets with the specific criteria for the grant you would like to apply for, this may be possible. If you don’t yet have your own bank account and/or are not formally constituted, we may consider an application from you if you have an organisation that is prepared to act as a host to receive the grant funding on your behalf.

Not all grant schemes allow for the use of host organisations. Read the specific grant guidance to find out if it is possible for you. If the grant you are applying for will allow the use of host organisations, the relevant application form will provide space for you to provide contact details for them.

Yes, providing the funding that you are looking for meets with our standard eligibility criteria and the specific criteria for the grant you would like to apply for. For CICs, we do have some additional criteria above that required for other organisations, details of which can be found in our General Guidance for Applicants document.

You will be required to provide some documents to enable us to carry out due diligence checks to ensure that our funding is in safe hands.  Details can be found within our General Guidance for Applicants document.

We would expect all organisations working with children, young people and vulnerable adults to have relevant safeguarding policies and procedures. As we all have a duty of care to safeguard those at risk, we would have concerns if your organisation does not have appropriate up to date policies, where relevant.

We do not ask for copies of Safeguarding polices as standard but some of our grant schemes, where priorities specifically relate to working with children, young people and vulnerable adults, will require them. Please refer to the guidance for the grant for which you are applying for funding.

Where we do not ask for Safeguarding policies, the application form may include a question on safeguarding so that we can understand how embedded safeguarding is within your organisation. If you do not have Safeguarding policies, you will be asked to explain why.

As part of the Terms and Conditions, you will be asked to confirm that you have Safeguarding policies in place, where appropriate.

If you don’t have a Safeguarding policy, we would recommend that you check to see whether you should have one. The NSPCC website is a good source of information and resources.

DCF aims to be an inclusive and accessible organisation and as such, would expect all funded organisations to be aligned with this. As a rule, we don’t currently request copies of Equality policies, or equivalent, to be submitted with an application but would expect all organisations to have them in place.

Where we have a funding opportunity that does require a copy of an Equality policy, the relevant guidance will advise of this.

As part of the Terms and Conditions, you will be asked to confirm that you have relevant Equality policies in place. We would suggest that if you don’t have appropriate policies, you aim to resolve this prior to submitting an application with us.

This document will provide us with a financial picture for your organisation and an up-to-date indication of recent activity. These also give us a sense of how you fund your work and other support you receive that helps us understand what you do.

We may contact you as part of the assessment of your application if we have any questions about your finances.  

We need a breakdown of monthly income and expenditure in a format that allows our assessors to clearly build an understanding of the financial position of your organisation.

Our assessors won’t have time to read through a series of bank statements to do this. The cashflow breakdown should be presented on an excel spreadsheet, in a word table, or equivalent.

If this causes you problems do get in touch.

The decision and notification timeframe will be outlined in the specific grant guidance.

Applications are assessed and reviewed regularly by a decision-making panel, with decision emails sent shortly after the panel review.  Failure to provide supporting documents or unclear responses to the application questions may delay your application being considered by the panel.

If your application is successful, payment of the grant should be made within 7 working days of notification. 

When you submit your application for funding, you will be required to confirm that you have read, understood and agree to our standard Terms and Conditions in relation to submitting the application and being awarded a grant.

For our Community Grants, if your application is successful, these Terms and Conditions will form the Grant Agreement between DCF and your organisation. The decision email that you will receive from us will confirm the amount that has been awarded and will make reference to the Terms and Conditions that you agreed to when submitting your application.

For other grants, it is likely that we will issue you with a Grant Agreement which will outline the agreed use of the funding and any conditions we require you to meet that are over and above our standard Terms and Conditions. This Grant Agreement will need to be signed and returned to us prior to payment being made to you. Please note that we do not accept e-signatures, so you will need to sign and scan the relevant pages and return the document to us by email or post.

Our standard Terms and Conditions can be found here.

We understand that things don’t always go to plan and that unexpected things happen. If you find this happens to your organisation, please talk to us at the earliest opportunity. If your overall project aims will still be met, we can usually apply flexibility – either in relation to the funded activity or length of the grant period. It is important that you do not redirect our grant to a completely different piece of work and that you adhere to your grant conditions.

We will always aim to be as flexible and understanding as possible and will only ask for the funding to be paid back in exceptional circumstances. If in doubt, please get in touch.

As part of our standard Terms and Conditions, we ask that you keep all receipts and financial records for a period of 7 years after your grant has finished. We undertake regular ‘spot-checks’ and may ask you to provide evidence of grant spend for the funding you received from us.

This will vary, depending on what grant scheme you are applying for. Please refer to the guidance for the specific grant to which you are applying. We will always tell you about the reporting you will need to do in the application guidance.

In order to complete your end of grant evaluation, you may need to provide us with specific details about the funded activity, for example, the number of people who were supported with the funding, their age range and gender. We would suggest that you keep a record of funded activity during the grant period, both in relation to the people accessing the activity and the number and type of activities.

If you do not meet our eligibility criteria for the grant for which you are applying, we will aim to notify you within 7 days of receipt of your application and will advise you in what way the application was not eligible.

If your application is unsuccessful, you will receive an email to advise of this decision. The email will include feedback from the decision-making panel where available. It will also provide contact details for our Community Insight Team, who you will have an opportunity to contact to request appropriate support if you would like to do so.

The timeframe for the decision to be notified to you will vary, depending on what grant scheme you are applying for. Decision timeframes can be found in the specific guidance for the grant scheme for which you are applying.

The decisions of our decision-making panels are ratified by our Senior Management Team and/or members of our Board of Trustees. These decisions are final, but should you wish to complain about a decision please email grants@devoncf.com in the first instance. A member of the team will be in touch to discuss further with you and to provide advice on our Complaints Procedure where required.

Yes please! It is our aim to help as many groups as we possibly can, and that means spreading the word to others like yours and to potential donors that can help us build up even more funds. If your application is successful, we will send you a Publicity Guidance document with your notification email. This will provide details on how to mention us in your social media platforms, how to share photos of the funded activity with us and include a link to our logo.

You can find a guide to news sharing on our How to Apply page.

By helping us to publicise the grants that we award, you will help us circulate the news of your amazing work with the hope that it will spark some more generosity and provide even more vital funds to support those looking after the most vulnerable in our communities. Thank you! 

The Grants Team will be happy to answer any questions you may have about our funding, the application process, supporting documents or completing the application form. Please email grants@devoncf.com with your enquiry and a member of the team will respond to your enquiry as soon as possible. Please note that this email is only monitored during normal working hours, Monday to Thursday.