Apply for a UK Grant

Comic Relief aims to treat applications from all organisations fairly and efficiently. Faced with limited resources and significant competition for grants, we are unfortunately unable to fund all of the applications we would like to support.

Furthermore, to keep things fair and equitable:

• organisations can only submit one application at a time
• if an application is unsuccessful, you cannot reapply for a grant to any programme (whether for the same project or a different project) for another 12 months.

Please read all the information below in full before applying

What we fund

Comic Relief makes grants in the programme areas outlined, and organisations can make only one application to one programme at a given time.

• We can give grants ranging between one and three years.
• We will fund both Revenue and Capital costs. Examples of Revenue costs are salaries and hire of facilities. Examples of Capital costs are computers and office equipment. We give building costs a low priority.
• We recognise that a true reflection of the cost of your project may include some organisational running costs. This is sometimes known as Full Cost Recovery. We are happy for you to include this expenditure in your budget.

What we don't fund

There are certain types of work and organisations that we do not fund. If your proposal falls into one of these categories, please do not apply to us:

• grants to individuals
• medical research or hospitals
• churches or other religious bodies where the monies will be used for religious purposes
• work where there is statutory responsibility to provide funding
• projects where the work has already taken place
• statutory bodies, such as local authorities and Primary Care Trusts, or organisations seeking funding to replace cuts by statutory bodies
• profit-making organisations, except social enterprise
• where your 'free' (unrestricted or designated) reserves are more than one year’s running costs, we may not provide the full amount you ask for – or may not fund at all – if we feel you have enough to pay for the work yourself.
• we are also unable to fund minibuses.

Who can apply

We are committed to funding work across the UK and are particularly keen to ensure we reach areas and groups of people who often miss out. As such, we accept applications from the voluntary and community sector throughout the UK including:

• constituted voluntary and community groups
• charities
• social enterprises
• co-operatives
• faith organisations
• community interest companies

Existing grant holders

If you currently hold a grant with us, you can only apply again during the final nine months of your existing grant period. This application can be for funding for the same project, or a different project. Note that we do not give automatic priority to work we have funded in the past, so please speak to the programme manager responsible for your existing grant before submitting a new application.

Organisations can usually only hold one grant at any time. However in some cases, a large national organisation may hold more than one grant with us where it can demonstrate it is the only organisation able to deliver work in a specific location, or the work is particularly groundbreaking. In this situation, please contact us before submitting an application.