2026-04-05-accounts - Rainow Village Bus

This text was generated using OCR and may contain errors. Check the original PDF to see the document submitted to the regulator.

Trustees' Annual Report for the period

Period start date Period end date Day Month Year Day Month Year From 06 04 2025 To 05 04 2026

Section A Reference and administration details

Charity name Other names charity is known by Registered charity number (if any) 1159414

Rainow Village Bus

Charity's principal address Tower, Hill House, Rainow, Macclesfield, Cheshire Postcode SK10 5TX

Names of the charity trustees who manage the charity

Trustee name	Office (if any)	Dates acted if not for whole year	Name of person (or body) entitled to appoint trustee (ifany)
Ken Butler	Chairman
TonyWilkinson	Treasurer
Dave Hasler	Secretary
Richard Warren		27/09/25	Existingtrustees

Names of the trustees for the charity, if any, (for example, any custodian trustees)

Name Dates acted if not for whole year

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Names and addresses of advisers (Optional information)

Type of adviser Name Address

Name of chief executive or names of senior staff members (Optional information)

Section B Structure, governance and management

Description of the charity’s trusts

Constitution

Type of governing document (eg. trust deed, constitution) Charitable Incorporated Organisation (CIO) How the charity is constituted

(eg. trust, association, company)

Appointed by the trustees Trustee selection methods

(eg. appointed by, elected by)

Additional governance issues (Optional information)

You may choose to include additional information, where relevant, about:

policies and procedures adopted for the induction and training of trustees;

Four trustees are responsible for the overall strategy and direction whilst other unpaid volunteers undertake specific tasks (including driving the bus) as the need arises. Richard Warren was added as a trustee on 27[th] September 2025 due to the ill health of the Chairman at that time. Tony Wilkinson took over as Acting Chairman for the remainder of this reporting period.

the charity’s organisational structure and any wider network with which the charity works;
relationship with any related parties;
trustees’ consideration of major risks and the system and procedures to manage them.

Section C Objectives and activities

Summary of the objects of the charity set out in its governing document

Rainow Village Bus (RVB) provides services which are available to all the residents of the village of Rainow in East Cheshire. RVB operates a 15 seat minibus and provides residents with a bookable transport service from Rainow and neighbouring towns for all the charitable, voluntary, community and social groups in Rainow and nearby villages. RVB has been operating since 2014. Originally the operation of a timetable service on Friday and Saturday evenings to Macclesfield was part of the RVB operation. However, this has not proved popular and so has been discontinued for the time being. This is kept under regular review however.

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The charity is a non-profit making charitable incorporated organisation with a constitution lodged with the Charities Commission. Trustees are elected by a meeting of all available volunteers and are expected to serve at least three years.

Locally devised systems for group hire bookings and vehicle operation are used. Regular articles providing updates of RVB activities appear in the quarterly village magazine. All vehicle management administration (servicing, maintenance, MOT checking, driver rotas) is carried out by Trustees or other volunteers.

Summary of the main activities undertaken for the public benefit in relation to these objects (include within this section the statutory declaration that trustees have had regard to the guidance issued by the Charity Commission on public benefit)

Additional details of objectives and activities (Optional information)

All activities are carried out by unpaid volunteers.

You may choose to include further statements, where relevant, about:

policy on grantmaking;
policy programme related investment;
contribution made by volunteers.

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Section D Achievements and performance

Summary of the main achievements of the charity during the year

Demand for the Rainow Village Bus services has remained high. In this reporting period there were 119 session bookings compared to 97 in the last financial year.

Bookings continue to involve a variety of local groups (e.g. Cubs, Scouts, Guides, local charities, Church groups, Women’s Institute, local Primary Schools, rambling groups and other local social groups) who have hired the vehicle for journeys of varying lengths throughout the period.

The type of bookings has remained similar to last year. The majority of bookings are from local schools and charities with almost 50% of bookings coming from just 1 Bollington based charity. Demand from Rainow based social groups is still lower than pre-pandemic. This reduced diversity of booking does increase the risk of significant fluctuations in booking volume from year to year.

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Section E Financial review

Brief statement of the charity’s policy on reserves

Rainow Village Bus endeavours to maintain sufficient cash reserves to cover running expenses during the year including unexpected expenses particularly those involving vehicle maintenance.

Details of any funds materially in deficit

Further financial review details (Optional information)

You may choose to include additional information, where relevant about:

the charity’s principal sources of funds (including any fundraising);
how expenditure has supported the key objectives of the charity;
investment policy and objectives including any ethical investment policy adopted.

The fixed cost (ie. not including fuel) of providing the Rainow Village Bus service is usually around £2500-£3,500 per annum. To cover this cost at least 60-70 session bookings per year are required. Maintenance costs can vary significantly year on year. Also new regulations on brake testing mean further addition costs year on year.

Groups pay a hire charge based on the time used (number of sessions) and distance covered. Charges are standard to all the users. Our income during the year was £6,363, while our expenditure was £4,001. At the end of the financial year our cash in the bank was £10,244.

No changes in charging for the bus hire have been made in the last financial year. They remain at £35 per session and 60p per mile.

Section F Other optional information

As has been indicated in previous annual reports, the operation of Rainow Village Bus has faced a number of challenges going forward. The 3 primary areas of concern being;

The limited number of active drivers. This issue is compounded by the fact that the necessary D1 on the licence is lost once aged 70 unless actively maintained. This latter process can be complex and time consuming and many drivers simply step down once they turn 70. The number of local (ie. Rainow-based) volunteer drivers is now down to 2. To balance this however, we have additional drivers identified by the Bridgend Centre in Bollington to supplement our driver pool.
The narrow nature of our customer base. Almost 50% of our bookings are by a single organisation – the Bridgend Centre in Bollington. At present overall demand remains high but If 1 or 2 of our biggest customers reduce their demand, the operation of RVB could become unsustainable. The vast majority of bookings are now made by individuals and organisations based outside Rainow.
The future management of the organisation, and the need to identify new Trustees to manage the operation going forward. In this reporting period one new trustee has been appointed and the other 3 trustees are remaining in place. However, finding new trustees has not been possible. None of the trustees have a D1 on their licence now and so cannot drive the bus. This is not a sustainable operating model.

Given these challenges, the future operation of Rainow Village Bus has been reviewed. At a meeting on 5[th] March 2026 the trustees took the decision to start the process of winding up the Rainow Village Bus CIO.

After the end of this reporting period (on 28[th] April 2026), it was agreed to donate the bus to the Bridgend Centre in Bollington to enable them to continue to provide a transport service for the local communities. Individuals and groups from Rainow will continue to be able to book this service in a similar way to before. The trustees are currently reviewing how to allocate the remaining cash assets before winding up the CIO.

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Section G Declaration

The trustees declare that they have approved the trustees’ report above.

Signed on behalf of the charity’s trustees

Signature(s) Anthony James Wilkinson Full name(s) Anthony James Wilkinson Position (eg Secretary, Chair, Treasurer, Trustee etc) Date 01/09/2026

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	Charity Name Rainow Village Bus	Charity Name Rainow Village Bus	Charity Name Rainow Village Bus	Charity Name Rainow Village Bus	CC16a
	For the period from	Period start date 06/04/2025	To

Section A Receipts and payments
A1 Receipts	Unrestricted funds to the nearest £ 6,363 - - - - - - - 6,363 - - - 6,363 4,001 - - - - - - - - 4,001 - - - 4,001 2,361 - 7,883 10,244	Restricted funds to the nearest £ - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -	Endowment funds to the nearest £	Total funds to the nearest £ 6,363 - - - - - - - 6,363 - - - 6,363 4,001 - - - - - - - - 4,001 - - - 4,001 2,361	Last year to the nearest £
General Income	6,363		- - - - - - - - -		5,331
	-				-
	-				-
	-				-
	-				-
	-				-
	-				-
	-				-
*Sub total*(Gross income for AR)	6,363				5,331

A2 Asset and investment sales, (see table).
	-		- - -
	-				-
*Sub total*	-				-
*Total receipts* A3 Payments
			-		5,331

General expenses	4,001		- - - - - - - - - -		4,574
	-				-
	-				-
	-				-
	-				-
	-				-
	-				-
	-				-
	-				-
**Sub total **	4,001				4,574

A4 Asset and investment purchases (see table)
,	-		- - -
	-
**Sub total **	-				-
*Total payments* *Net of receipts/(payments)* A5 Transfers between funds A6 Cash funds last year end *Cash funds this year end*
			-		4,574

	2,361		-		957
	-		- -	- 7,883	-
	7,883				6,926
	10,244		-	10,244	7,883

CCXX R1 accounts (SS)

17/08/2026

Section B Statement of assets and liabilities at the end of the period

Details Details *Total cash funds* (agree balances with receipts and payments account(s)) Details Details Mercedes Sprinter 524 Minibus delivered ~~November 2016 (approximate value)~~ Details Signature AnthonyJames Wilkinson	Unrestricted funds Restricted funds to nearest £ to nearest £ - - - - - - 7,883 - Agreement Error OK Unrestricted funds Restricted funds to nearest £ to nearest £ - - - - - - - - - - - - Fund to which asset belongs Cost (optional) - - - - - Fund to which asset belongs Cost (optional) - - - - - - - - - Fund to which liability relates Amount due (optional) - - - - - Print Name Anthony James Wilkinson (Treasurer and Trustee)	Endowment funds to nearest £
		-
		-
		-
		-
		OK
		Endowment funds to nearest £
		-
		-
		-
		-
		-
		-
		Current value (optional)
		-
		-
		-
		-
		-
		Current value (optional)
		20,000
		-
		-
		-
		-
		-
		-
		-
		-
		When due (optional)






		Date of approval
AnthonyJames Wilkinson	Anthony James Wilkinson (Treasurer and Trustee)	01/09/2026

CCXX R2 accounts (SS)

17/08/2026