Scout SuiteHow-to guide
Claiming Gift Aid
Parents declare themselves Gift Aid eligible in the parent portal. The treasurer then puts matching donations into a claim and downloads an R68. Filing with HMRC still happens outside the app.
Turn Gift Aid on for the group
In Settings → General settings, under Organisation, tick Gift Aid registered. That's what makes the Gift Aid section appear in Finance → Reports & Compliance, and what lets parents declare in the parent portal. Charity number and Gift Aid reference are optional fields on the same page.
Parents declare themselves
Once Gift Aid is on, each parent sees a Gift Aid card in the parent portal. Declare Gift Aid asks for their name, home address and postcode, and a confirmation that they're a UK taxpayer. That's stored as an ongoing online declaration against their account.
Parent portalOngoingOnlineYou can still record a declaration yourself from the Gift Aid tab (Add declaration (parent or contact)) or from Contacts — for someone without a portal login, or if they gave one verbally or on paper. To revoke later, do it from the contact — Revoke, with a reason. Revoked declarations are left out of new claims.
Make sure donations can be matched
A claim only includes completed payments that aren't invoice payments (card and Direct Debit against a subs or camp invoice are left out) and whose payer has an active declaration. If you recorded a donation or a cash/bank payment, link the donor — in Banking, when you Explain transaction, use Link donor for Gift Aid.
Membership subs paid as invoices through the parent portal are not packed into a Gift Aid claim. This flow is for donations and other recorded payments where a donor with a declaration is linked. Collecting those invoices is covered in Collecting subs.
Create a claim for the period
On the Gift Aid tab, New Claim, set Period Start and Period End, then Create Claim. Scout Suite finds matching donations in that window, works out Gift Aid at 25p in the pound, and opens a draft (numbered like GA-2026-001) with each donor, donation date and amount. This is a treasurer job.
If nothing eligible falls in that period, you'll get an error rather than an empty claim — check declarations and donor links first. There's no separate "eligible donations" list to browse beforehand.
Download the R68, file it, then mark it submitted
Open the claim and Download R68 Report — a CSV you upload or file with HMRC in the usual way (Government Gateway, not from inside Scout Suite). When that's done, Mark as submitted keeps a record here. You can Upload Receipt for HMRC's acknowledgement, and later Update HMRC status notes if you want them on the claim.
Scout Suite does not send the claim to HMRC. There is no HMRC integration. Mark as submitted only changes the status in your records — the download and the filing are the real HMRC step.
Money
More in this topic
Subs, Gift Aid, and reconciling the bank.