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2024-12-31-accounts

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2024

Bampton Heritage & Visitor Centre

11[th] Annual Report.

BHVC 11[th] ANNUAL REPORT - 2024 Registered Charity No 1156194. CHAIRMAN’S OVERVIEW OF THE YEAR by Judi Thomas Another busy and rewarding year has passed. We have been a key part of our community, hosting events and welcoming both visitors and local residents, former residents and Friends of BHVC. Along with sharing good time, this year brought us great sadness with the sudden loss of our curator Ken Mills. Ken was with us as a Trustee from the opening of the Centre and with his experience, enthusiasm and thirst for learning he took on the management of our collection. We miss him very much. Thanks to Andy Macdonald and his great team, the refurbished Centre re-opened in February. The new look was much appreciated by volunteers who gave great feedback on the new layout, with much better light and space for the railway model and the new attractive shop and information display. My sincere thanks go to all volunteers. The number of unpaid hours given across a variety of roles are invaluable and very much appreciated. Individual skills, talent and passion create an amazing team of which I, and fellow Trustees, are immensely proud to be members. a Highlights of the year include: Our 11[th] year was focused on raising our profile, both locally and further afield.

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BHVC 11[th] ANNUAL REPORT - 2024 Registered Charity No 1156194.

Our thanks, as always, go to the Parochial Church Council (PCC) and in particular Sue Leach and Tony Mount, who with Kevin Chandra, who have kept us updated with aspects of church business affecting BHVC.

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BHVC 11[th] ANNUAL REPORT - 2024 Registered Charity No 1156194.

CENTRE ACTIVITY

The numbers of visitors BHVC welcomed to the Centre or attended an event within the last 7 years are shown below. 2024 shows an increase in numbers but remain lower than preCovid. Interestingly the visitor numbers are higher in the spring months than previously, but lower in early Autumn.

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2018 2019 2020 2021 2022 2023 2024
Jan 37 52 62 0 0 0 47
Feb 59 104 76 0 20 0 164
Mar 65 105 42 0 13 100 143
Apr 177 93 0 0 62 90 208
May 180 231 0 23 77 87 110
Jun 186 119 0 57 59 84 93
Jul 186 119 0 57 59 119 69
Aug 226 235 32 231 120 109 180
Sep 163 146 8 196 497 286 81
Oct 99 248 13 79 83 110 75
Nov 141 60 0 44 0 0 15
Dec 72 32 0 0 0 12 24
TOTAL 1,591 1,544 233 687 990 997 1,209
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TOWN TRAILS

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2018 2019 2020 2021 2022 2023 2024
Jan 5 0
Feb 6 2 2
Mar 5 7 19
Apr 11 5
May 27 16 0
Jun 8 10 4 25 0
Jul 5 8 2
Aug 2 6
Sep 14 4 8 18 6 2
Oct 9 3 12 0
Nov 5 0 8 2 4
Dec 4 6 8 4 6
TOTAL 40 84 15 58 33 22 44
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BHVC 11[th] ANNUAL REPORT - 2024 Registered Charity No 1156194.

TREASURER’S REPORT by Rachel Macdonald

Yet again, I am pleased to draw your attention to the healthy financial position of the Bampton Heritage and Visitor Centre. These formal accounts are presented in a straightforward format to demonstrate that BHVC acts openly, honestly and responsibly when managing money. BHVC thanks our Independent Examiner, Geoff Girdlestone, for his support and guidance in preparing these accounts.

The accounts are divided into two sources of revenue – Restricted and Unrestricted.

RESTRICTED FUNDS - grants or donations which can only be used for specific projects. Income is not always spent in the year it is received.

Income: £150 , with thanks to the Toucan for their donation of £100 and Rotary for £50, both to be put towards the cost of publishing a new walks booklet. Expenditure: £100 on two projects during 2024. The first was a translation of the Court Roll. The second was the September walking festival where Bampton joined other towns around Mid Devon to offer an array of walks.

UNRESTRICTED FUNDS - monies raised by BHVC Volunteers through activities such as the shop and stall sales, town trails, events etc.

Income: £8,921 . £2,481 sales and £1,333 donations, a reduction on last year, due to the cost of living increase and reduced spending power along with less activities around the town at Christmas. Street stalls continue to be a popular gathering point for heritage information and to find unusual and unique gifts –thanks to the Volunteers who staff them, and not always on warm, sunny days!

The Quiz Night was an important contributor to 2024 income. Thanks to Volunteers Carol Poole for her skills with the questions, Derek Webster for an excellent bar service and all the other Volunteers who helped make the evening such a success. BHVC will run its third quiz in 2025.

Two additional credits were made, an insurance claim and a donation from a charity donation scheme. This money is shown as Other Income in the Summary Account. Expenditure: £4,000 , a decrease on last year, reflecting our lower sales income. The costs of the refurbishment of the Centre straddled both 2023 and 2024 and expenditure of £357 (Repairs and Maintenance) reflects this. The annual payment to the Church increased to usual levels as the charges for heating oil are again reflected in the charge.

NET INCOME (income minus expenditure): £4,971 . It is worth noting that despite a drop in sales and donations, BHVC made a small surplus, inflated by Other Income.

The stable financial position recorded above is due to continuing hard work by Trustees and Volunteers, and support from local business and members of the community – the Centre only remains viable because of those endeavours.

Following input from both Volunteers and Friends, Trustees have identified projects for which funding is required in 2025. These form part of the 2025 Reserves Policy.

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BHVC 11[th] ANNUAL REPORT - 2024 Registered Charity No 1156194.

BAMPTON HERITAGE AND VISITOR CENTRE

Accounts for year ending 31st December 2024

2023
INCOME
2,270
Donations
4,274
Sales
439
Gift Aid Refund
202
Well Being Walks
875
Grants
0
Other
8,060
EXPENDITURE
22
Admin
80
Equipment/Materials
675
Events
137
Museum Collection
644
Overheads
90
Publicity
858
Repairs & Maintenance
2,065
Shop stock
105
Subscriptions
30
Volunteer support & training
26
Well being walks
0
Walking
352
Town maps
0
Court roll
5,090
2,970
Net Income
1,636
Assets minus depreciation (20%)
16,957
Balances - Bank
0
Balance with Paypal
381
Cash in hand
0
Money owed to BHVC
2,172
Stock
19,510
Total Assets		 £
Restricted
150		 £
£
Unrestricted Total
1,333
1,333
2,481
2,481
0
0
499
499
0
150
4,608
4,608
150 8,921
9,071
Restricted
30
0
70		 Unrestricted Total
64
64
168
168
391
391
71
71
666
666
19
19
357
357
1,590
1,590
20
20
156
156
499
499
30
0
70
100 4,000
4,100
50 4,921
4,971
1,309
22,146
73
90
0
2,105
24,414

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BHVC 11[th] ANNUAL REPORT - 2024 Registered Charity No 1156194.

OUR VOLUNTEERS by our Volunteer Lead Alison Brooker

We say this every year, because it’s true, our volunteers are the backbone of BHVC, we could not function without them and are indebted for the time and commitment they give in keeping the Centre open and welcoming visitors.

This year we welcome 2 new volunteers; Michael and Nic and one returning Volunteer Debra who was with us at the very beginning.

The Centre is currently open for 8 hours a week over 3 days. If we were to calculate the number of hours our volunteers give in total it comes to 3072 hrs per year just for the Centre and that’s with only one volunteer per shift, ideally we like our Centre to be manned by two people at a time but this is not always possible. It is a significant amount of time and we sometimes struggle to fill all the volunteers slots and this coming year we face the challenge of our Chairman stepping down along with one of the Trustees which will leave us with only 2 volunteer Trustees, the minimum number at which BHVC can function.

Of course, we don’t only have volunteers in the Centre, they support our Street Stalls, lead our Town Trails and Bank Holiday walks as well as acting as backstops and providing tea for the weary walkers. We run 3 - 4 events each year when we bring our volunteers together to share ideas and hear they views but mainly to socialise and get to know each other. The annual Summer Tea Party being a highlight.

Bampton has many opportunities for people to volunteer and we are grateful to those that choose to volunteer with BHVC.

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BHVC 11[th] ANNUAL REPORT - 2024 Registered Charity No 1156194.

PUBLICITY AND SOCIAL MEDIA – Marian Girling

2025 was certainly another busy year for us at Bampton Heritage Centre, with so many events to plan and, of course, they all needed promoting.

We started the year off with several visits from Bampton Primary School, where we organised sessions on the local history for them as well as our exciting Church Quiz Trail. It was great fun for the children and for us.

We ran our Quiz night again in May and again, it was a great success. It was well attended with a great atmosphere. Everyone had great time are really enjoyed our Ploughman’s supper and bar too. This is a great fund raiser for us too.

We did lots of walks in 2024 everything from our popular Town Trails, Bank Holiday Walks and this year we took part in the inaugural Mid Devon Walking Festival. We were pleased to be able to launch the Walking Festival and our walkers were seen off by invited guests. In total we ran 5 walks of various lengths over the fortnight and had visitors come from all over Mid Devon to take part.

In the autumn we held another Heritage Open Days event this time taking their Maps, Routes and Connections theme. We held a fantastic exhibition in the Heritage Centre organised and presented by one of our Volunteers, Andy Macdonald. Everyone who came was very impressed by it and spent ages looking at everything; in fact, several commented that they had only intended to pop in for ten minutes but ended up staying for over an hour!

We finished the year with our Twixtmas Walks, one long walk and one Town Trail. We had people come all the way from Wiveliscombe for our Town Trail and they let us know that they had found it a “fascinating, informative and companiable” event.

All these events require lots of publicity and we make use of local publications, notice boards in Bampton and further afield and, of course, social media.

We continue to go from strength to strength on our Social Media platforms, especially with Facebook. We now have 998 Followers on Facebook and 356 followers on Instagram. We have people as far away as New Zealand, Canada, Bahamas and Sweden following us.

Social media is a great way for us to promote the Heritage Centre and a great tool to promote our events to specific interest groups.

We look forward to another year which has some interesting new events as well as some favourites.

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BHVC 11[th] ANNUAL REPORT - 2024 Registered Charity No 1156194.

A TRUSTEE’S PERSONAL VIEW by Phil Venn

I've really enjoyed my experience as a trustee, and having recently retired, it has provided me with a new interest.

As a 'local' being born and bred in Bampton, I have met many people from the past, and resurrected friendships as a result. Talking over 'old' times has certainly kept the mind sharp.

The recording memories interviews with Gail, were enthralling, and the people we interviewed had great and accurate recollections of Bampton in the past.

The ongoing plans we have in place for 2025, is something to look forward to, a busy time ahead awaits!

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BHVC 11[th] ANNUAL REPORT - 2024 Registered Charity No 1156194.

SECRETARY AND DIGITAL ARHIVE by Chris Price

Having picked up the secretary role for BHVC in January 2023, I’ve managed to improve the way in which we manage the documentation and systems that help us operate. We now are able to provide access to relevant documentation to the Trustees, Volunteers and people external to BHVC and be sure we know what needs to be reviewed and updated. We share BHVC documentation online with Trustees, and via the Bampton Website for Volunteers and the public.

We have a number of mandatory policies that we need to maintain to preserve our status as a CIC. These are mostly available to anybody outside of the charity upon request. This of course may not be that exciting, but they are essential to the operations of BHVC.

In 2024 have introduced software to BHVC that has been obtained free of charge through Microsoft’s Not-for-Profit scheme. We have 10 Microsoft 365 licenses – these provide all the Trustees with significant online storage that can be shared and together with a host of tools to allow us to manage it, including standard Microsoft Office tools (Word, Excel, PowerPoint etc.) and Zoom for online meetings without the normal restrictions that we’d face without the licences.

In 2024 we introduced a risk management process. Through regular quarterly reviews we consider any new and existing risks that the charity may be exposed to and agree and follow through on action plans to mitigate the most significant risks. This activity helps ensure that we have a successful, financially viable charity that offers the best for Bampton.

Towards the end of 2023 we did a lot of work to pull together a Collection Database that built on the excellent work our late colleague Ken Mills did for us as Curator. The Collection Database helps us to track and maintain our collection of artefacts and digital records online and be able to find them more easily. This activity has progressed significantly through 2024 and with help of a number of digital archive volunteers we are cataloguing and digitizing more of our collection, thereby making it easier to search and find information more quickly. There is much more we can do here and there’s no doubt the digitization work with continue in 2025 and beyond.

Our growing collection is of immense importance. We have made considerable progress on the format and operation of our digital archive. Work will continue, with the help of the digital archive volunteers. This new archive will contribute to the conservation of the collection and improve access for all.

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BHVC 11[th] ANNUAL REPORT - 2024 Registered Charity No 1156194.

GOVERNANCE OF THE CHARITY by Judi Thomas

The Charity is governed by five Trustees who set the strategy for the Centre, run it on a day-to-day basis, coordinate volunteer recruitment and training and ensure financial stability. We have a standard Charity Commission constitution and submit accounts and reports to the Commission each year.

We maintain a framework of underpinning governance which includes safe and robust systems and processes. These ensure accountability, scrutiny, compliance and due diligence covering the activities of everyone within BHVC.

The Trustees meet on a regular basis to deal with substantial business. All volunteers are invited to join the meeting. Agenda and papers are available in advance in the volunteers’ secure area of the website. Also, following each meeting the minutes showing decisions from the meeting and other relevant information are available.

The AGM took place on the 25[th] March 2024 and confirmed the following 5 Trustees

.

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