Has the Royal Society of Mencap declared any possible fraudulent activity?

Thank you for your email to the Charity Commission.

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from receipt of your email. We will ensure that our response is both
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Dear Mrs Lord,

Thank you for your query, which we received on 6 February 2010.

I am treating your query as a request made under the Freedom of
Information Act 2000.

I will respond to your query within 20 working days from the day we
received it. If you have any questions, please contact me.

Yours sincerely,

Jeremy Stewart

Senior Liaison Officer

Large Charities Division

Ph. 020 7674 2320

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Dear Mrs Lord

Thank you for your email of the 6 February, which I have treated as a
request made under the Freedom of Information Act 2000 (“FOI”). Thank
you also for your email of 1 March regarding the 20 working-day response
period.

Your request

Information on fraud at the Royal Mencap Society (222377)

You have asked whether we hold information about possible fraud reported
to us between 2005 – 2008 in relation to the Royal Mencap Society
(222377).

Following a search of our paper and electronic records relating to the
charity, I can advise that we do not hold any information in relation to
this.

Reporting fraud to the Charity Commission

You have also asked about reporting fraud to us, I can advise the
following:

o We regard fraud as a serious incident. We expect charities to report
all serious incidents to us as soon as they become aware of them. We
publish guidance for trustees on this:

[1]http://www.charitycommission.gov.uk/inve...

For charities with an income over £25,000, the trustees must, as
part of their annual reporting obligations, sign a declaration that there
are no serious incidents that they should have brought

to our attention but have not.

o Employees and other members of the public can complain to us about a
charity. Our guidance CC47 - Complaints about charities explains
what types of complaints we will and will not take forward and the
information with which we need to be provided:

[2]http://www.charitycommission.gov.uk/publ...

In particular, section E of this guidance, Making a complaint under
the Public Interest Disclosure Act 1998 (PIDA) also known as
'whistleblowing' may be of assistance.

o If you are thinking of making a complaint as a ‘whistleblower’ you
might want to contact Public Concern, which is an independent
authority on public interest whistleblowing:

[3]http://www.pcaw.co.uk/index.htm

The 20 working-day time period

Your email to me of 1 March asked why I had not responded to your request
within the time period prescribed.

It may be helpful if I clarify the timescale for responding to FOI
requests. We received your request on Saturday 6 February 2010. Because we
received the request at the weekend it is treated as being received on the
next first working day, in this case, Monday 8 February. The 20
working-day time period began on Tuesday 9 March and ends today.
Therefore I do not believe my response has exceeded the 20 working-day
time period.

Further options

If you are unhappy with our response to your FOI request, have a complaint
or wish to request a review of our FOI decision, you should write to:
Charity Commission Direct, PO Box 1227, LIVERPOOL, L69 3UG. Please state
what it is you are dissatisfied with, which will assist us when we review
our response.

If you request a Decision Review you will be notified of our final
decision. Please note that we will accept requests for a Decision Review
up to a maximum of 3 months after the original decision. The 3 months will
be calculated from the date on which you receive written notification of
the original decision. You will be deemed to have received written
notification on the day after the letter enclosing the decision was sent
or the same day if the decision was sent by email.

If after this you remain unhappy with the decision, you may apply directly
to the Information Commissioner (ICO) for a decision. Generally, the ICO
cannot make a decision unless you have exhausted our complaints
procedure. The Information Commissioner can be contacted at: The
Information Commissioner’s Office, Wycliffe House, Water Lane, Wilmslow,
Cheshire SK9 5AF.

I hope this is clear and has been helpful.

Yours sincerely,

Jeremy Stewart

Charity Commission

This email and any files transmitted with it are confidential and intended
solely for the use of the individual or entity to whom they are addressed.
If you have received this email in error please notify the sender and
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References

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2. http://www.charitycommission.gov.uk/publ...
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