# How to Produce a Charity Funder Report Without Spending a Week on It

Funder reporting is one of the most time-consuming administrative burdens in small charity finance. A finance officer managing ten restricted grants, each with quarterly reporting requirements, may spend forty separate reporting exercises per year — each requiring several hours of work.

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## Why Funder Reporting Takes So Long

The data in the accounting system is not in the format the funder wants. Finance officers must export data, reformat it, add narrative, check it against the grant agreement, and produce a presentable document. Repeated for every grant, every quarter.

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## The Foundations of Efficient Funder Reporting

**Code transactions correctly from the start.** If transactions are coded to the correct restricted fund at point of entry, funder reporting is largely a matter of extracting data that already exists in the right format.

**Maintain a funder reporting schedule.** List every active grant, the reporting deadlines, what is required, and who is responsible.

**Create a template for each funder.** The first time takes effort. Every subsequent report is significantly faster.

**Separate financial and narrative reporting.** Finance produces the financial component. The programme team produces the narrative. Do not let one block the other.

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## How Fyntel Supports Funder Reporting

Fyntel's restricted fund tracking produces a fund-by-fund financial report for every restricted grant automatically — income received, expenditure charged, balance remaining — as part of every management accounts cycle.

The financial data needed for a funder report is always available in a clear, reconciled format. Finance officers spend less time extracting and reformatting and more time on the relationship aspects of funder reporting.

Fyntel is currently accepting waitlist registrations at [fyntel.co.uk](http://fyntel.co.uk).

*Fyntel is a SORP-compliant management accounts and reporting tool for small UK charities. Join the waitlist at* [*fyntel.co.uk*](http://fyntel.co.uk)*.*