Terms

Version: 2026-11-05.7

Who we are

Your contract is with Westcountry Hosting Ltd, trading as Charity Starter, company 13864742, registered in England and Wales. Registered office: 82A James Carter Road, Mildenhall, IP28 7DE.

Support and complaints are handled by email at hello@charitystarter.co.uk or by post to our registered office. We reply within 2 working days. We do not offer telephone support.

Charity Starter is an independent service. We are not the Charity Commission, HMRC, the CIC Regulator or Companies House, and we are not connected to them.

Registering a charity is free. You can apply yourself on GOV.UK, using the Commission's free model constitutions. HMRC recognition for Gift Aid is also free.

What you get

We prepare a readiness pack from your answers and provide up to 5 automated reviews. You complete, check, sign and submit the application. The relevant regulator decides.

Readiness pack £99, plus £39 if you add Gift Aid set-up. HMRC recognition pack on its own £39. CIC readiness pack £49.

Governing document. For a CIO we fill in the Commission's model constitution from your answers; it marks the choices still left to you. For a trust or charitable company we fill in the Commission's model trust deed, or articles and memorandum, from your answers; it marks the choices still left to you. For a CIC you get your CIC36 and IN01 answers and the details for the CIC Regulator's model articles, not completed official forms or articles.

Companies House charges its own fee to register a CIC (£115 online, £139 on paper). You pay it to Companies House when you apply.

We don't submit or file anything for you.

Ordering and your contract

Check and correct your order before paying. Switching on the Terms line and pressing Pay is your order. Your contract starts when we confirm successful payment by email. We provide access with that email. Reviews run automatically when you submit; your pack can then be downloaded. Contracts are in English.

You contract personally unless you are authorised to contract for an existing organisation.

The confirmation email includes the full text of the version of these terms you accepted: keep it. Earlier versions stay online at /terms/ followed by the version. You sign in with a link sent to your email, not a password. Use a current browser and an email address you can access. Packs download as ZIP files containing Word documents and a CSV cashbook template: you need software that opens them. Download and save your pack within 90 days of payment.

Reviews

Our AI review compares your answers with published guidance and returns findings and a grade. It can make mistakes. Each review after the first also says which earlier findings are resolved and which are still outstanding. The grade guides the submission walkthrough; it does not decide registration or HMRC recognition. Email hello@charitystarter.co.uk to challenge a result or report an access problem.

Not legal advice

This is not legal advice. We are not solicitors and we do not act for you. The pack is general guidance based on the published rules of the Charity Commission, HMRC, the CIC Regulator and Companies House. For unusual circumstances, check the regulator's free guidance or contact the regulator before applying.

Refunds and cancellation

We give every customer a full refund of their pack if they cancel within 14 days of the contract, even after a review or download, or at any time before their first review, whichever is later. Your rights if something is wrong continue.

Within those 14 days your first review starts only when you ask for it with the switch above Submit for review. Asking does not end your right to a full refund.

To cancel, use Cancel and refund in your account, or tell us clearly by email to hello@charitystarter.co.uk or by post to Westcountry Hosting Ltd, 82A James Carter Road, Mildenhall, IP28 7DE. You may use the form below, but do not have to. We refund within 14 days of your notice, to the original payment method, without a fee. You don't need an order number.

Cancellation form
To Westcountry Hosting Ltd, 82A James Carter Road, Mildenhall, IP28 7DE; hello@charitystarter.co.uk.
I/We hereby give notice that I/We cancel my/our contract for the supply of the following digital content/for the provision of the following service: ____.
Ordered on: ____.
Name of consumer(s): ____.
Address of consumer(s): ____.
Signature of consumer(s), only if this form is notified on paper: ____.
Date: ____.
Delete as appropriate.

If something is wrong

Digital content must be of satisfactory quality, fit for purpose and as described. Services must be carried out with reasonable care and skill. If we fail these standards, you may be entitled to repair or replacement of content, repeat performance of services, or a price reduction up to a full refund. Other legal remedies remain available.

We do not guarantee registration or HMRC recognition. A refusal or query alone does not entitle you to a refund. This does not limit your rights if our content or service is faulty or misdescribed.

Websites

The free website (name.charitystarter.co.uk) is free while your charity is on the Charity Commission register, or while your academy, free school, foundation or voluntary school, or college is open on the Department for Education's register (Get Information about Schools). It goes live automatically once the register shows it's yours: the charity's register email matches your account or confirms it, or for a school or college, you sign in from an email address at the website the register lists.

Not on a register, or a CIC? You can have your website on your own domain only (£5 a month or £50 a year, email included). It goes live there once the domain is registered and set up. It never has a charitystarter.co.uk address. If your organisation later appears on one of the registers above, you can add the free address too. A community interest company (CIC) can't be a registered charity, so a CIC's website is always on its own domain only.

Taking a site down. We take a site offline only if, after a report, we reasonably find its content unlawful, harmful or misleading, 30 days after we warn you that the organisation has left the register (free-address websites), if an own-domain-only website's name or number turns out to match the Charity Commission register (or briefly, until we can check a new name against it), or when the pack it came with is refunded in full. We tell you why. Reply to that email to challenge it and we look again. Taking a site offline doesn't end your paid subscriptions: you can cancel them in your account.

Your website's contact form: our processing terms. For messages sent through it you are the controller and we are your processor (UK GDPR Article 28). What: the sender's name, email address and message, about visitors who write to your organisation, processed only to deliver each message to the address you set, for as long as your website runs. How: we act only on your documented instructions, which are these terms and your website settings, including for any transfer outside the UK; we tell you at once if we think an instruction breaks data protection law. Anyone at Westcountry Hosting who handles them is bound by confidentiality. We keep them secure (encrypted connections, access limited to the delivery function) and do not store them after delivery, apart from our 30-day security logs. Subprocessors: you authorise Amazon Web Services (sending email, London) and Cloudflare (running the form); each is bound by data protection terms giving the same protection. We tell you by email at least 30 days before adding or replacing one, and you can object by email; if we cannot meet the objection you can end your website without charge. Help: we help you answer requests from the people who wrote, keep their data secure, deal with any breach (we tell you without undue delay), and carry out any assessment or consultation with the ICO. End: when your website ends, nothing remains to return or delete beyond those logs, which expire. Checks: we give you the information needed to show we meet these terms and allow and contribute to audits and inspections by you or your auditor, on reasonable notice.

Email and own domain

Email on your free site address costs £2 a month or £20 a year. An own domain costs £5 a month or £50 a year, including our email DNS setup. Each renews automatically at your chosen interval until you cancel. Cancellation is free in your account and stops the next renewal; paid service continues until the end of the paid period.

If you choose email at checkout, Stripe saves your card. Once your website is verified and live, we email you at least 3 days before charging it and starting the subscription. If you choose an own domain with the free website, we invite you to select it after go-live. Without a register route, or for a CIC, you select it when you set up your website. Either way you complete a separate subscription checkout. No domain payment is taken just because the website goes live.

Your subscription contract starts when we confirm your subscription choice by email. You can cancel free before the first payment. For email, we give all customers a full refund of the first subscription payment if they cancel within 14 days of that contract or within 14 days of the first payment, whichever is later. After that, cancellation stops the next renewal. If your chosen Google or Microsoft provider cannot support the address, email us: we will cancel and refund your first subscription payment.

Own domain refunds. With the free website you can choose a domain only once your website is live. At checkout you ask us to register it straight away. If you cancel within 14 days of your subscription contract or of the first payment, whichever is later: before the domain is registered, we refund the first payment in full; after it's registered, we refund the first payment less a £5 domain registration charge and less the days of service used, worked out on the rest of the payment. On the monthly plan that leaves nothing to refund. We show the amount before you confirm. The domain stays registered to your organisation for the registry term already paid, and cancelling stops the next renewal. If registration fails, we refund the first payment automatically. The same applies if your chosen Google or Microsoft provider cannot support the address. Your rights if something is wrong continue.

We email you during the 30 days before each yearly renewal.

We manage DNS records; we do not supply mailboxes. You need your own Google or Microsoft account and must meet its eligibility and payment terms. Our fee does not guarantee approval or a free mailbox. Being a CIC doesn't on its own qualify for Google's or Microsoft's free charity plans.

If your site is turned off, deleted, or your charity leaves the register, email keeps working for 90 days; then we remove the records. When you move to your own domain, or back from it, email at the old address also keeps working for 90 days, and, on the free-address route, your free address redirects to your domain for as long as your site exists. An address that has had email is never given to another charity.

The domain is registered in your organisation's name. When your domain plan ends, we stop renewing the domain. We tell you its registry expiry date. Ask us to transfer it to another provider before then if you want to keep it.

Prices

Prices are the total you pay. Westcountry Hosting Ltd is not VAT registered, so no VAT is added. Add-ons are never added for you: you choose them.

Law

These terms are governed by the law of England and Wales. If you live in Scotland or Northern Ireland, you keep the protections of your local law and can bring a claim there.