How we are funded and how our funds are spent
Helpforce is funded by NHS and care organisations, and charitable trusts and donors. Find out more about where our money comes from and how we spend it.
Helpforce is very grateful to the many funders who support our work. We work hard to ensure the money we get from generous trusts, foundations and statutory funders is used efficiently and effectively to support our mission to accelerate the growth and impact of volunteering across health and care.
Helpforce (registered charity name, Helpforce Community) receives funding from a variety of sources, including grants, philanthropic donations, and income from our charitable trading with health and care organisations.
Funding from statutory sources
The funding from health and care organisations contributes to wider programmes or pays for our expertise to design, establish, scale up and evaluate volunteering solutions to meet specific regional or place-based needs.
Philanthropic funding
Our philanthropic funding sometimes pays for a specific project or programme, such as the funding we received from The National Lottery Community Fund to work with ICSs to develop volunteering services that optimise partnerships with community services. Find out more about our ICS Back to Health programme.
Philanthropic funding also pays for Helpforce to continue to provide wider general services without a charge, especially our peer Network for volunteering leaders across health, care and community. Learn more about the Network here.
Working with partners
Our funding pays for us to develop and evaluate volunteering services with a wide range of partners across health, care and the community.
The volunteering services we develop with our partners are delivered on the ground by regional or local organisations.
Our partners fund the volunteering services we help them develop from a variety of sources, including existing service funding, commissioning mechanisms (such as through the local integrated care board or public health funding) or philanthropic funding.
Our income and expenditure
A summary of where our funding came from in 2023/4:
- 52% Direct grants
- 32% Charitable activity
- 12% Direct donations
- 4% Investment income
Here's a summary of how we spent our funding in 2023/4:
- 20% Raising awareness (Helpforce Network events and support)
- 19% Adopt & Adapt (developing volunteering services)
- 16% Innovation (developing and testing new volunteering services)
- 14% Insight & Impact (evaluating volunteering services)
- 13% Digital development (developing digital tools to support our work)
- 13% Support (supporting our project work, including communications and finance)
- 3% Raising funds
- 2% Governance
Thank you
We’re very grateful to all our funders:
Our funders this year:
- Burdett Trust for Nursing
- Circle Integrated Care
- Famsa Foundation
- Garfield Weston Foundation
- Golden Bottle Trust
- John Armitage Charitable Trust
- NHS England
- Oak Foundation
- Peacock Charitable Trust
- PF Charitable Trust
- Sobell Foundation
- Telstra Health UK
- The Honourable Michael Samuel
- The National Lottery Community Fund
- The Said Family
And our health and care organisation funders.
And on our journey here:
- Advent International
- Andrew Denton
- Andrew Page
- Health Education England
- Henry Oldfield Trust
- Optum Services
- Royal Voluntary Service
- Peter Sowerby
- Peter Vardy Christmas Campaign
- Sequoia Trust
- Schroder Foundation
- Sir Thomas Hughes Hallett
- Swires Charitable Trust
- The Dulverton Trust
- The Gaudio Family
- The Hon P Gibson Charitable Trust
- WCVA
You might be interested in
Learning more about us
Volunteers are doing great things across health and care, in the NHS and in our communities – but volunteering is still not making the impact it could for patients, staff and on wider systems.Helpforce exists to make this happen. Here we explain how.
The Network
At Helpforce, we believe in the value of community and that’s why we created the Network, a free online peer community for professionals from statutory and voluntary sector organisations with an interest in volunteering in health and care. The Network is the place where you can share your knowledge, learn from your peers and find practical support and resources.
Latest news and case studies
Catch up with what is happening at Helpforce and learn how our support makes a difference to our partners.
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