## **Charity Number: 1172812 Company Number: CE010206**
## **The Friends Of March Railway Station (FOMRS)**
**Annual Report and Accounts**
**1 April 2024 – 31 March 2025**
## **Purposes, Aims and Objectives**
The purposes, aims and objectives of the Friends Of March Railway Station (FOMRS) are:
- Maintaining and preserving buildings of heritage importance and interest, associated with the history of railways in March
- Make the facilitates of a community room, library, meeting facilities and lecture room available to community groups and community support groups
- Providing resources for learning about the history of and the role the railway has played in development of the town
- A place to display and be viewed by the general public, artefacts donated to the group that relate to the railway history of March
## **Achievements**
The Victorian Railway Carriage is now safely stored back at the Station awaiting the rebuild. FOMRS would like to thank all the volunteers that had helped on the many trips to Needingworth to dismantle the carriage, and in particular the ‘Make & Mend, March Men’s Shed, Incorporating the Women’s Shed, to Shaun and Helen from G&C Lombardo Ltd and to ‘Trucker Tim’ Carter, without whom none of the progress made on the project so far would have been possible.
It was a busy year for fundraising which included £2500 donated by REPTA; £470 donated by the March Masonic Lodges; £355 raised from the sale of a book about March Station; £1450 donated via a JustGiving Page that had been set up to help with the restoration of the carriage.
Several events took place across the year. The Model Railway Exhibition in May, two Heritage Open Days in September, and a Christmas Craft Fayre in November. A Guided Meditation Group were now using the Community Rooms on a regular basis.
FOMRS had hosted successful visits for groups of school children from Westwood Primary School, local cubs and guide groups.
The volunteers had enjoyed visits to Whitemoor Yard and both March East & March South signal boxes. FOMRS would like to thank the people involved in helping to arrange these trips.
FOMRS had also been lucky enough to have had a large number of railway books donated to the Group which have been sortied and catalogued.
At the AGM the group were informed that the Charity Commission Report had been prepared and submitted in time. It was also confirmed that the Group’s insurance had been renewed with a new company that offered a better level of cover, which included working at height.
Progress on the Community Model Railway continued and the layout was set up and working for events. Two successful running days were held between Christmas and New Year which had been well received by all those that attended.
## **Financial Review**
The Group has an online bank account with Lloyds.
Total receipts on unrestricted funds for the period were £4,830.28. This was substantially boosted by a donation from the Railway Employees & Public Transport Association (REPTA) which closed and distributed its funds to likeminded groups.
Restricted funds of £1,290.95 were received this period towards the Victorian Carriage Restoration Project.
A restricted grant of £329.92 was granted by March Town Council for the purchase of tools and plants to be used by the adopter group on the operational side of the platform. This grant was fully expended in the period.
During the period £439.38 was spent on maintenance and repairs of the rooms and the outside works. Other costs were planters and plants for the station area at £816.98, £30.00 for Cambridgeshire Council for Voluntary Services annual membership, £201.82 for the Groups Liability Insurance, £1,555.60 for sundries and £231.24 event costs.
The net result for the year was a surplus of receipts over payments of £3,407.95. Adding bank and deposit balances brought forward at the beginning of the year, the balance carried forward at 31st March 2024 on unrestricted funds is £6,629.43 plus £1490.95 restricted funds, giving a total of £8,120.38.
## **Reserves Policy**
FOMRS has an agreement to maintain a balance of circa £2,500 General Funds to cover any unforeseen costs. As a result of the Pandemic the group had to fall back on these reserves to cover the deficit and plans to replenish the reserves through fundraising activities and events have been extremely successful. This was boosted last period by the REPTA windfall of £2,500 which is being held in designated future project reserves for match funding purposes.
The restricted grant of £400 from March Town Council received in 2019-2020 for a gazebo for events which was to be purchased in March 2019 but due to Covid19 did not happen was expended in this period with the purchase of a large heavy-duty gazebo for events.
Restricted funds are also being held for the Victorian Carriage Restoration project, and similarly these funds will be held outside of the Reserves Policy to fund this multiyear project. The total reserved restricted funds for the Victorian Carriage Restoration project is £1,490.95 which includes £200 carried forward from last period.
FOMRS in general works on a basis of applying for Grants for specific projects.
## **Volunteers**
We would like to thank all our volunteers that work hard to make the station a vibrant and lively place.
## **Structure, Management and Governance**
The FOMRS structure, management and governance is defined in the groups constitution and FOMRS is a Charitable Incorporated Organisation (CIO) by Association (an organisation with voting members other than its charity trustees). The Group has a committee of four Trustees that fulfil the officer roles of Chair, Vice Chair, Secretary and Treasurer.
All decisions are overseen by the Committee and all members have voting rights on all proposals, which are discussed and voted on at regular members meetings and the AGM.
## **Administrative Information**
The Friends Of March Railway Station is based at and has the buildings on Platform 2 of March Railway Station, the address of which is 4 Station Approach, March PE15 8SJ.
The up-to-date contact details for The Friends Of March Railway Station can be found on the Charity Commission website.
The FOMRS Committee of Trustees for the period of this report were:
Robert Able – Chair
Gary Christy – Vice Chair
Mandy Ward – Secretary
Nicola Christy – Treasurer
|**Friends Of March Railway Station (FOMRS)**|**Friends Of March Railway Station (FOMRS)**|**Friends Of March Railway Station (FOMRS)**|**Friends Of March Railway Station (FOMRS)**|**Friends Of March Railway Station (FOMRS)**||||**1172812**|**1172812**||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|**Section A Receipts and payments**
**Unrestricted**
**funds**
**Restricted**
**funds**
**Endowment**
**funds**
**Total funds**
**to the nearest**
**£**
**to the nearest £**
**to the nearest £**
**to the nearest £**
**A1 Receipts**
01/04/2024
31/03/2025
**Receipts and payments accounts**
Period start date
Period end date
**To**
**For the period**
**from**
ee
ee ee
ee||||||||||||**Last year**
**to the nearest £**
**CC16a**|**to the nearest £**||||
|Donations
**2,751**||**1,290**||**-**|**-**|**-**|**-**||**4,041**|**4,041**||**-**|**-**|**-**|**-**||
|Grants
**330**||**330**||**-**|**-**|**-**|**-**||**660**|**660**||**-**|**-**|**-**|**-**||
|Funds from Events
**1,750**||||**-**|**-**|**-**|**-**||**1,750**|**1,750**||**-**|**-**|**-**|**-**||
|**-**||**-**||**-**|**-**|**-**|**-**||**-**|**-**||**-**|**-**|**-**|**-**||
|**-**||**-**||**-**|**-**|**-**|**-**||**-**|**-**||**-**|**-**|**-**|**-**||
|**-**||**-**||**-**|**-**|**-**|**-**||**-**|**-**||**-**|**-**|**-**|**-**||
|**-**||**-**||**-**|**-**|**-**|**-**||**-**|**-**||**-**|**-**|**-**|**-**||
|**-**||**-**||**-**|**-**|**-**|**-**||**-**|**-**||**-**|**-**|**-**|**-**||
|**_Sub total_**_(Gross income for_
_AR)_
**4,831**||**1,620**||**-**|**-**|**-**|**-**||**6,451**|**6,451**||**-**|**-**|**-**|**-**||
|**A2 Asset and investment sales,**
**(see table).**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**_Sub total_ -**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**_Total receipts_**
**4,831**
**1,620**
**-**
**6,451**
**-**
**A3 Payments**
—————~~——~~|||||||||||||||||
|Plants
**766**||**51**||**-**|**-**|**-**|**-**||**817**|**817**||**-**|**-**|**-**|**-**||
|Cost of Events
**231**||**-**||**-**|**-**|**-**|**-**||**231**|**231**||**-**|**-**|**-**|**-**||
|Maintenance and Repairs
**439**||||**-**|**-**|**-**|**-**||**439**|**439**||**-**|**-**|**-**|**-**||
|CCVS Membership
**30**||**-**||**-**|**-**|**-**|**-**||**30**|**30**||**-**|**-**|**-**|**-**||
|Insurance
**202**||**-**||**-**|**-**|**-**|**-**||**202**|**202**||**-**|**-**|**-**|**-**||
|Sundaries
**645**||**679**||**-**|**-**|**-**|**-**||**1,324**|**1,324**||**-**|**-**|**-**|**-**||
|||**-**||**-**|**-**|**-**|**-**||**-**|**-**||**-**|**-**|**-**|**-**||
|**-**||**-**||**-**|**-**|**-**|**-**||**-**|**-**||**-**|**-**|**-**|**-**||
|**-**||**-**||**-**|**-**|**-**|**-**||**-**|**-**||**-**|**-**|**-**|**-**||
|**_Sub total_ 2,313**||**730**||**-**|**-**|**-**|**-**||**3,043**|**3,043**||**-**|**-**|**-**|**-**||
|**A4 Asset and investment**
**purchases, (see table)**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**_Sub total_ -**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**_Total payments_**
**2,313**
**730**
**-**
**3,043**
**-**
**_Net of receipts/(payments)_**
**2,518**
**890**
**-**
**3,408**
**-**
**A5 Transfers between funds**
**-**
**- -**
**-**
**-**
**A6 Cash funds last year end**
**4,112**
**600**
**-**
**4,712**
**-**
**_Cash funds this year end_**
**6,630**
**1,490**
**- 8,120**
**-**
———~~——~~
SSSS=|||||||||||||||||
CCXX R1 accounts (SS)
09/01/2026
1
## **Section B Statement of assets and liabilities at the end of the period**
|**Categories**
Signed by one or two trustees on
behalf of all the trustees
**B5 Liabilities**
**B3 Investment assets**
**B2 Other monetary assets**
**B4 Assets retained for the**
**charity’s own use**
**B1 Cash funds**|**Details**
**Details**
**Details**
**Details**
**_Total cash funds_**
(agree balances with receipts and payments
account(s))
**Details**
Bank Accont
Cash
Signature|**Unrestricted**
**funds**
**Restricted**
**funds**
**to nearest £**
**to nearest £**
**6,171**
**1,490**
**459**
**-**
**-**
**6,630**
**1,490**
OK
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|**Endowment**
**funds**
**to nearest £**
**-**
**-**
**-**|
|---|---|---|---|
||||**-**|
||||OK|
||||**Endowment**
**funds**
**to nearest £**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**Current value**
**(optional)**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**Current value**
**(optional)**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**-**
**When due**
**(optional)**
Date of
approval|
CCXX R2 accounts (SS)
09/01/2026
2