How far back can you claim Gift Aid? The four-year rule

The rule

Four years from the end of the period, not from the date of the gift

HMRC lets a charity claim Gift Aid up to four years after the end of the period in which the donation was received. Which period counts depends on how your charity is set up:

Charitable trusts: four years from the end of the tax year (5 April) in which the donation was received.
All other charities, including charitable companies, CIOs and unincorporated associations, and Community Amateur Sports Clubs: four years from the end of the accounting period in which the donation was received.

Because the clock starts at the end of the period, a donation received early in a period can be claimed for almost five years. One received on the last day of a period has exactly four.

Source: HMRC, Charities: detailed guidance notes, Chapter 6: claims and returns.

Coming up

The deadlines that matter now

Accounting year ended 31 December 2022 (charities other than trusts): claim by 31 December 2026.
Accounting year ended 31 March 2023 (charities other than trusts): claim by 31 March 2027.
Tax year 2022 to 2023 (charitable trusts): claim by 5 April 2027.

For any other year end, add four years to the last day of the accounting period. Once a deadline has passed, the Gift Aid on those donations is lost for good.

Where it goes missing

Most unclaimed Gift Aid is already sitting in your database

In our experience the money is rarely in donations nobody knows about. It is in records you already hold:

declarations that exist but were never linked to the gifts they cover;
gifts coded as not eligible when they were;
names and addresses HMRC will not accept, so the gift was held back and never claimed;
claims that stopped, or skipped a period, after a change of CRM or payment platform.

The oldest periods expire first, so they are the ones to check first.

Check before it expires

Every record, checked against HMRC's rules

Giftease has built Gift Aid systems for UK charities since 2004. We check your data against HMRC’s rules record by record, not by sample, and show you what is still claimable and when each part of it expires.

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Every donation and declaration checked, not a sample
What is claimable now, and what needs a detail fixed first
Which periods expire next, and how much is in each
Built on Cascade, the engine that files live Gift Aid claims with HMRC

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Common questions about the four-year rule

Can we still claim on donations from five years ago?

Usually not. Gift Aid can only be claimed within four years of the end of the tax year (charitable trusts) or the accounting period (all other charities) in which the donation was received. A donation made early in a period can still be claimable for up to a year beyond four years from its date, so check the period end, not the gift date.

Does the four years run from the date of the donation?

No. It runs from the end of the period the donation was received in: the tax year ending 5 April if you are a charitable trust, or your accounting period for any other kind of charity, including companies, CIOs and unincorporated associations.

A supporter gave a declaration after their donation. Does it count?

It can. A Gift Aid declaration can cover past donations as well as future ones, and HMRC’s model wording covers donations made in the previous four years. The donation must still be inside the claim window, and the declaration must have been in place before you claim.

Our claims stopped after we changed systems. Can we catch up?

Yes, for any donations still inside the four-year window. Work oldest first, because those periods expire soonest, and make sure each donation has a valid declaration and a supporter HMRC can identify before it goes into a claim.

What if an earlier claim was too high?

HMRC expects an over-claim to be corrected with an adjustment on a later claim, rather than by amending the old one. If you will not be making another claim, or the amount is large, tell HMRC and repay it instead. If you are unsure whether past claims were right, check before you claim again.

Gift Aid deadlines