DOWNE HOUSE TRUST

Registered charity 309091 · accounts filings on the Charity Commission register · also known as DOWNE HOUSE SCHOOL, DOWNE HOUSE TRUST 21ST CENTURY APPEAL, THE COLD ASH TRUST, THE DOWNE HOUSE TRUST

The object of Downe House Trust is the provision and conduct at or near Cold Ash, near Newbury, of a day or day and boarding school for girls. To that end the trust provides and intends to provide the 110 acre site and properties used by Downe House School.

Objects

THE PROVISION AND CONDUCT AT OR NEAR COLD ASH NEAR NEWBURY OF A DAY OR DAY AND BOARDING SCHOOL FOR GIRLS

Area of benefit: NOT DEFINED

The charity’s charitable objects and area of benefit, quoted from its governing document as held on the Charity Commission register.

Causes: Education/training · website · Get email alerts

Financial health, per its FY2025 accounts

The accounts state that unrestricted reserves of £9,859,000 are fully represented by tangible fixed assets and associated liabilities, with no free funds beyond these assets and commitments. The charity reports a net outgoing of resources of £1,988,000 for the year, supported by a letter of support from its parent undertaking, Downe House School, which has also written off significant debt to strengthen the Trust's balance sheet.

Automated summary of the FY2025 accounts; the evidenced findings below carry the verbatim passages.

What the accounts disclose

Accounts audited by HaysMac LLP. Discloses 5 of 6 completeness components.

Policies the charity declares

In its annual return the charity told the Commission that it has the policies listed below. This is self-declared: it is not verified by the Commission or by this site, and it is not evidence of how a policy works in practice.

• Bullying and harassment policy and procedures
• Campaigns and political activity policy and procedures
• Complaints handling
• Complaints policy and procedures
• Conflicting interests
• Engaging external speakers at charity events policy and procedures
• Financial reserves policy and procedures
• Internal charity financial controls policy and procedures
• Internal risk management policy and procedures
• Investing charity funds policy and procedures
• Risk management
• Safeguarding policy and procedures
• Safeguarding vulnerable beneficiaries
• Serious incident reporting policy and procedures
• Social media policy and procedures
• Trustee conflicts of interest policy and procedures
• Trustee expenses policy and procedures

Public profiles (found on the charity’s own website): facebook · instagram

Structured financials (annual return, FY ending 31/08/2025)

Reported reserves equal ~0.0 months of spending — in the bottom quarter for charities its size (median 5.2 months; benchmarks).

Per its annual return, largest income source: Charitable activities (100% of income) — components as reported reconcile to the return’s total income; not from the accounts narrative.

Per its annual return, cost of raising funds: 0.0% of total income — below the median for charities its size (4.9%) (benchmarks).

Trustees · trustee networks

• Downe House School

Trustee list from the Charity Commission register (current, not historical).

Operates in: West Berkshire

Income and spending

Common questions

Funders of similar charities

Funders whose accounts show grants to charities similar to this one (and no recorded grant to this charity) — a starting list for fundraisers.

Charities like this

Semantically similar by activities and financial character, from our analysed corpus. Compare with DOWNE HOUSE FOUNDATION.

• DOWNE HOUSE FOUNDATION income £393k
• THE DOWNS SCHOOL TRUST income £106k
• DOWNE HOUSE SCHOOL income £29.6m
• THE DOWNS SCHOOL (CHARLTON HOUSE) LIMITED income £5.8m
• SHREWSBURY HOUSE SCHOOL TRUST LIMITED income £11.0m
• THE SOUTHDOWN SCHOOL TRUST income £144k

Side by side with its peers

Each row is that charity’s latest analysed filing; every value is quote-backed on its own page.