Incorporating Your Club
Did you know that unincorporated sports clubs (also known as unincorporated associations) have no 'legal personality' and their committee members are personally liable for any decisions made on behalf of the club.
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Incorporating your club will essentially see it become recognised as a legal entity in its own right, giving members limited liability (usually limited to a nominal £1).
To date, we’ve supported the incorporation of over 60 sports organisations across the UK. This includes semi-professional football clubs such as Annan Athletic (who we supported the incorporate of as a Community Benefit Society), Dunbar United (as a Community Interest Company) and multiple amateur grassroots clubs of all sports and sizes such as Salisbury Stingrays Swimming Club (as a Charitable Incorporated Organisation) and Callander Cricket Club (as a Scottish Charitable Incorporated Organisation).
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Our support includes assistance selecting the right legal structure for your club, drafting (or editing) a suitable governing document for that legal structure, applying and registering your club with the relevant regulator on your behalf and transferring assets to the new entity. We have club-specific governing documents pre-approved by regulators, not to mention huge experience in the field.
We can often support clubs with the entire process for as little as £1000 (although a final sum will depend on any complexities/specific requests your club might have – e.g. if your club operates a bar and requires a trading subsidiary).
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Check our guidance on legal structures for your sports club or get in touch for more information.
Our Support
We offer thorough support throughout the incorporation process, whichever legal structure you choose to adopt. After an initial conversation to discuss the pros and cons of incorporation and a range of legal structures available to your club, we will provide you club with the following support.
01
Discuss Incorporation and Legal Structures
We will meet with your committee to discuss what incorporation would mean for your club and discuss the various legal structures open to you. We will discuss the advantages and disadvantages of each and charitable status.
03
Register Your Club with the Regulator
After your governing document has been agreed by the committee, we will liase with the regulator on your behalf, registering your club with the either the Charity Commission, OSCR, the FCA or Companies House.
05
Transfer your Club Assets
Once incorporated, we will help your club transfer assets between the unincorporated assocation and the new entity.
02
Develop New Governing Document
We will work with your committee to develop a new governing document, suitable for the legal structure you are adopting. We have club-specific governing documents pre-approved by regulators which can make the process quicker.
04
Deliver Workshop on Compliance
We will deliver an educational webinar for committee members. The session will cover the 'must' dos for the club, including the production of annual reports and also the 'best practice' for the club in terms of governance.
06
Register your club for Gift Aid
Once your incorporation has been confirmed, we'll register your club with HMRC for the purposes of claiming Gift Aid (where eligible).
Testimonials
Barry McGeachy, Callander Cricket Club
"Club Development Consultancy's knowledge and expertise in club development was instrumental in helping the cricket & football clubs come together and create a new community sports hub with charitable status.
They made the process of creating and writing the governing documents really simple, the application to OSCR was also seamless.
We can not recommend engaging with CDC highly enough"
Interested in finding out more? Request a quote.
Drop us a note via the form opposite or email andrew@clubdevelopment.co