When a major gift lands in month eleven

A gift that arrives in February after ten thin months will make every earlier bar look like a complaint. It is not a complaint. It is a calendar.

We keep the monthly bars honest and write on month eleven: ‘Includes a single gift of £X, received on [date], unrestricted / restricted to [name].’ The annotation is small. It does more work than redrawing the year as a smooth climb.

Staff sometimes want the gift spread backwards so the year looks planned. Trustees who later read the bank statements will see the lump. Spreading it is a kindness that becomes a problem at audit time.

If the gift is restricted, month eleven can look rich while the charity still cannot pay the gas bill from that line. The board pack that month needs the restricted block on the facing page. Otherwise the fundraising lead spends the meeting explaining why they are still running a coffee morning.

Meredith keeps a working rule at the studio: if a single gift is larger than the median month, it gets a sentence, not a colour change. Colour is decoration. A sentence can be read aloud by the chair.

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