Receiving a grant guidance: £100,000 to £250,000

Receiving a grant guidance: £100,000 to £250,000

This guidance sets out how you will receive your grant of £100,000 to £250,000.
It also explains what we expect of you before, during and after receiving it.

Page last updated: 13 April 2023. See updates.

Introduction

Congratulations on being awarded a Grant, we look forward to helping you deliver a successful Project. The funding you will receive is public money from National Lottery players, and it is our duty to make sure  that it is managed in an accountable way. This means that there are a number of processes that you need to follow throughout the life of your Project. We try to make these proportionate to the level of Grant you are receiving.

We appreciate that this may be the first time you have received funding from us and you may be unsure how to request your Grant and keep us informed about your progress. This document will explain what to do and will answer any queries you may have.

We like to work in a collaborative way, so keep in touch with us if you need our support. Your first point of contact with The National Lottery Heritage Fund is the person named in your Grant notification email. We expect you to respond promptly to any requests for information and to discuss any substantial changes to your Project with us. You must address any issues we identify throughout your Project.

We would like to visit or meet all of the organisations we fund but unfortunately, this is not always possible. However, please invite us to key Project events and openings and we will aim to send a representative where possible.

We will carry out checks throughout your Project to confirm that you are delivering the Outcomes identified in your Application and the Approved Purposes set out in the Legal Agreement.

This document sets out our standard practices but please note we may choose to vary our processes depending on the specific circumstances of your Project.

We have created a useful Glossary of Terms which is located in Appendix D of this page. If you are unsure of any terms used in this document refer to this section.

Top tips

  • don’t start your Project before we give you permission
  • consider evaluation of your Project from the beginning
  • acknowledge your funding and promote The National Lottery
  • keep track of your Project spend
  • keep track of your Project timetable
  • keep all invoices and receipts organised
  • know your Approved Purposes
  • review and learn from what you are doing
  • remember to claim your Grant
  • make sure you speak to us about any issues
  • keep Project evidence, for example from launches, workshops and promotion
  • above all else, enjoy your Project

Project timeline

  1. grant award
  2. submit the Legal Agreement within six months of the date you received the email asking you to complete this
  3. deliver your Project activity
  4. submit Completion Report within three months of completing your Project
  5. duration of Grant Contract: up to 20 years

How we will work with you

This section explains the guidelines we expect you to follow when delivering your Project. If you are unsure of any of the points raised, please get in touch with us.

Important documents

We recommend that you familiarise yourself with the following documents before starting   your Project

  • Grant Contract
  • Application Guidance
  • acknowledgement section of our website
  • Evaluation guidance
  • Good practice guidance

All guidance is available in the Funding and Good practice guidance sections of the website.

We also recommend that all those closely involved in the delivery of your Project are familiar with the Application you submitted to us. In particular the Outcomes and the Approved Purposes you committed to deliver.

Grant Expiry Date

Your Grant Expiry Date is given in your Legal Agreement. It is based on the Project timescale that you identified in your Application.

You must complete your Project and send us your Completion Report and Final Payment Request by the Grant Expiry Date.

If you experience delays in delivering your Project you can request an extension to the Grant Expiry Date.

We try to be flexible but cannot guarantee an extension. If your Project takes more than a maximum of five years to complete from the date you completed your Legal Agreement, we may close your Grant and ask for the repayment of all or part of your Grant.

Promotion of your National Lottery Grant

Promoting and acknowledging The National Lottery is a condition of the Grant Contract. You can find out more about our minimum requirements for acknowledgement on our website. As well as acknowledging your Grant we expect you to provide special access and/or offers to National Lottery players, on at least an annual basis. For example, we may ask you to participate in a campaign to thank National Lottery players, for instance the #ThanksToYou campaign.

We encourage you to develop innovative and creative offers or promotions designed to thank National Lottery players for their support and to raise awareness of our funding. Examples of these, and other imaginative things that Projects have done can be found on our website.

You must acknowledge your Grant publicly as soon as your Project starts by displaying the National Lottery acknowledgment logo. The logo can be found on the acknowledgement section of our website.

You must also make sure you include The National Lottery logo on any information you produce about your Project, for example, on public consultation or fundraising information or materials. You must also include the logo on all designs or plans you produce, on all specialist reports or surveys, and on all tender documents or job adverts that are funded by your Grant. Please refer to our website for more information.

If you do not comply with our acknowledgment guidelines we reserve the right to stop making payments and to request repayment of some or all of your Grant.

If you need any help or have any questions about acknowledging your Grant, please get in touch with us.

Grant publicity

It is important to publicise your Grant award to local media so that National Lottery players know where their money is being spent. We ask that you keep your Grant confidential until we have discussed and agreed your publicity plans. We will publish  that you have been awarded a Grant on our website within 20 days of your Grant being awarded.

We can assist you with queries about publicity and the media. A template press release can be found on our website, the template includes the correct wording so you will just need to insert your Project information where required.

Procurement: consultants, contractors and suppliers

In all projects, whenever you use your Grant to purchase goods, works or services, we will ask you to give us details of the procurement (which is the buying, tendering and selection process). If you have already purchased goods, works or services for your project, you will need to tell us how you did it. We cannot pay your Grant if you have not followed the following procedure.

You should always consider equality of treatment, transparency, mutual recognition and proportionality when procuring any goods, works or services.

If you are a Public Body grantee or your project is subject to Public Procurement legislation, then you must follow the relevant legislation.

Procedures to recruit consultants and contractors must be fair and open and comply with relevant equality and employment legislation. Fees for any consultants or other professionals that you recruit during the project should be in line with professional guidelines and be based on a clear written specification. If any of the contractors, suppliers or consultants you wish to appoint are linked – for example close friends or relatives, or if there is any financial link such as ownership of these suppliers – you will need to get  written permission from us first.

If you are unsure about your obligations, we advise you to take professional or legal advice.

Under £10,000

If you are buying goods, works or services for under £10,000 you do not need to openly tender for these or get multiple quotes. We will still expect you to show overall value for money.

Between £10,000 and £50,000

You must get at least three competitive quotes for all goods, works and services worth £10,000 or more (excluding VAT) that we have agreed to fund.

You do not necessarily need to appoint the contractor, supplier or consultant who provides the lowest quote. When deciding who to appoint for your Project, you should look at the overall value for money the quote presents and the skills, experience and financial viability of the contractor, supplier or consultant.

Above £50,000

For all goods, works and services worth more than £50,000 (excluding VAT), you must provide proof of competitive tendering procedures. Your proof should be a report on the tenders you have received, together with your decision on which to accept.

You do not necessarily need to appoint the contractor, supplier or consultant who provides the lowest quote. When deciding who to appoint for your project, you should look at the overall value for money the quote presents and the skills, experience and financial viability of the contractor, supplier or consultant.

In some circumstances, you do not need to undertake a competitive tendering procedure and you can invite only one organisation to tender. This is where:

  • The total price of the contract is less than £10,000.
  • A framework agreement is in place for the supply of goods, works or services which has been previously competitively tendered. The goods or services are directly relevant to the scope of the project works to be undertaken.
  • There is a project contract in place, which has previously been competitively tendered, and it is logical to extend to cover additional project work. In this case you must confirm that:
    • for capital works, the prices of most elements of work, including preliminaries, overheads and profits can be directly applied from the existing contract to the new work
    • the new work is smaller in scale, and is of a similar type to the main contract work
    • the contractor will not claim disruption or prolongation cost to the main contract if the new work is introduced
    • the existing contract restricts work being undertaken by others
  • The goods, works or services required are unique as set out in a non-branded requirement specification and it is not possible to get them from other sources by competitive tender.
  • You can demonstrate that you have tried to tender the goods, works or services openly and competitively but had not received sufficient interest. The only tender received was submitted by a service provider who believed they were doing so in competition with others.
  • Emergency work where it can be shown that time taken to get tenders would put the project at risk and add considerably to eventual costs.
  • The company providing the single tender is not connected, either through ownership or through family connections, with senior representatives of the grantee.

We will also require you to consider social values in your procurement, including:

  • diverse supply chains
  • improved employability and skills
  • inclusion, mental health and wellbeing
  • environmental sustainability
  • safe supply chains

You should make sure that any contractor/supplier/consultant or Partner who may contribute to the creation of Digital Outputs is aware of our requirement for projects to share these under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International licence or equivalent. Also, make sure you have agreement for the resulting work to be shared in this way.

Where this is not possible, you must seek written agreement to make alternative arrangements with us, for example to use an alternative Open Licence, prior to issuing any contract of work.

Recruitment of staff

All staff posts must be advertised with the following exceptions:

  • If you have a suitably qualified member of staff on your payroll that you are moving into the post created by your Project.
  • If you have a suitably qualified member of staff on your payroll whose hours you are extending so that they can work on the Project. In this case we will fund the cost of their additional hours spent on the Project and you will need to tell us about the role they will undertake.

We may ask to see evidence of the recruitment procedure you followed so keep these records safe.

If you are moving an existing member of staff into a post created by the Project, then we can either pay for the cost of this member of staff, or for the cost of backfilling their post (where an employee is assigned to a new job and their position is temporarily filled by another employee), whichever cost is less

If you wish to appoint any new members of staff on your Project who are linked with any members of staff at your organisation, for example, any close friends, relatives, or ex-members of staff, you will need to get written permission from us first.

All salaries should be based on sector guidelines or similar posts elsewhere.

We are committed to ensuring that the heritage sector is inclusive and organisationally-sustainable. You must use the Living Wage rate (and London Living Wage where applicable) for all Project staff.

VAT

We cannot cover the costs of VAT that you can reclaim, it is therefore your responsibility to seek appropriate advice.

If your VAT status changes during your Project we will reduce our contribution to the costs where you have managed to claim back the VAT.

Photographic record

We expect you to capture photographs throughout your Project showing your progress. You should submit the photos with your Project Updates (where relevant). You will need to provide at least five high-resolution photos showing different aspects of your Project with your Completion Report and Final Payment Request.

We may make use of your images in publicity material. You give us the right to use those you provide us with at any time, including altering them. Before sending them to us, you must get all the permissions required for both you and us to make use of them.. These images, along with other Digital Outputs from your project, should also be shared with an Open Licence (Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International). If you are not the rights holder, you must make sure you have agreement to share these images under this specified Open Licence.

You must make sure that you collect appropriate written consent from anyone who appears in these images that they can be reused in relation to publicity and promotional materials, and that they can be shared online under the specified Open Licence. This is particularly important where images include young people or vulnerable adults and where specific permission must be sought in advance. If you require any guidance on this please speak to us.

If your images are not suitable for sharing under an Open Licence, other arrangements will need to be put in place. Please speak to us as soon as possible.

Community Grants Scheme

As part of your Project, you may have asked us to contribute towards a ring fenced pot of money that you can use to fund other groups/organisations (who we call Community Grantees) to deliver small discrete Projects (Community Grants).

These Community Grants will contribute to the overall aims of your Project. Any Grants like this must demonstrate good value for money, and public benefit should outweigh any private gain. You will manage the funding pot, develop an application process with a decision panel and monitor progress. The Community Grant Scheme must also be publicised by you, so it is widely known and open to all.

These grants may include activities on and/or capital works to land in third party ownership (see Appendix B).

Our website has more information about delivering a Community Grant Scheme and FAQs.

Agree your Grant

Once we have told you that you have been awarded a Grant, you will receive an email asking you to sign into your online account to check and agree your Grant. This is known as the Legal Agreement.

To agree to the Grant, you will need to:

  • tell us if there are any changes to your Project since you first applied, for example changes to partners or cash contributions
  • check the details we have about your project are correct
  • send us any new evidence for your project, for example cash contributions, permissions or licenses
  • read the terms and conditions of the Grant and the Standard Terms of Grant
  • read this Receiving a Grant guidance
  • tell us details of two legal signatories for your organisation, so we can send them a link to download, read, sign and upload the terms and conditions

You will also need to send us:

  • proof of cash contributions and/or a fundraising plan (mandatory if applicable)  
  • proof of Property ownership including, for example, up-to-date copies of the Land Registry title register (with plan), leases and evidence of any existing mortgages (mandatory if applicable) etc
  • proof of any necessary statutory permissions or licences (mandatory if applicable)
  • updated Project plan (mandatory if substantial changes since you applied for your grant)
  • project cashflow forecast (mandatory for Projects that are undertaking capital works)

The Legal Agreement must be submitted within six months of the date you received the email asking you to complete this. If there are substantial delays, we may decide to withdraw the offer of your Grant.

Before we are able to grant you permission to start your Project, you will need to complete the following tasks (if applicable):

  • secure all partnership funding (if identified in your Application)
  • obtain statutory permissions, for example listed building consent or faculty
  • secure any necessary licences, for example a newt or bat licence
  • secure ownership of freehold or leasehold Property to meet our requirements – please see Appendix A

Once we have processed your Legal Agreement, we will confirm this to you. You can then start work on your Project. You should not start any work on your Project until you have our written permission to do so. If you do so, it is at your own risk.

Payment of your Grant

We will pay your Grant in arrears once you are able to provide invoices or receipts that demonstrate your Project expenditure. We will agree a payment schedule with you and payments will be made as the Project progresses, subject to you providing evidence of expenditure.

You will need to submit a Payment Request to request payment of your Grant. We typically expect a Project Update to be submitted with the Payment Request, as we usually only release payments after being satisfied with the progress of your Project.

We will pay a proportion of the costs you have incurred based on the Grant Percentage. For example, if you provide invoices totalling £50,000 and the Grant Percentage is 85%, your Grant payment will be £42,500.

We aim to release your Grant payment within 10 working days of receiving a Payment Request and all the mandatory supporting documents.

We withhold the final 10% of your Grant until the Project is completed. We will only pay the full 10% if the total Project costs have been spent and are evidenced in your Completion Report and Final Payment Request.

If you spend less than your agreed costs and your Project completes under budget, you will need to return to us any Grant that has not been spent. This will be calculated based on your overall Project costs and the Grant Percentage.

Updating us on your Project

Once we have confirmed you have permission to start your Project you do not need to complete any further forms until you are ready to claim the first instalment of your Grant.

However, you must get in touch with us as soon as possible about any problems or significant issues that arise during the course of your Project. For example, issues that could lead to changes in costs, serious delays, or failure to deliver the Approved Purposes and Outcomes. This is  so that we can respond and support you as appropriate.

Let us know in advance about any events and update us on any successes and good news stories.

Project changes

You cannot change the Approved Purposes of your Project without our prior written agreement. If you want us to consider any changes to your Approved Purposes you must send us written details of the reasons for the request and explain how it will affect:

  • the quality and Outcomes of your Project
  • the cost of your Project
  • the time you need to complete your Project
  • the future viability of your Project

We may then re-assess the Project or take any other action we consider necessary. We may give permission for the change only if you agree to keep to extra terms and conditions.

Any changes that are agreed with us must be in writing and should also be reported in your Project Update and/or Completion Report and Final Payment Request.

Timetable delays

If you think that you will not be able to complete your Project before the Grant Expiry Date, then get in touch with us so we can discuss this with you. We try to be flexible but cannot guarantee an extension and we do not expect your Project to take more than a maximum of five years to complete from the date you submitted your Legal Agreement.

Budget changes

All money spent on the Project should be reported against the cost headings in your Application.

If you need to make minor changes and move funds between these cost headings in order to achieve your Approved Purposes, you can report on this in your Project Update. You must demonstrate how these changes helped you to deliver your Project.

You must get in touch with us in advance if you want to propose any substantial changes to these cost headings and for any major spending of your contingency.

If you spend less than your agreed costs and your Project completes under budget, we will adjust your final payment accordingly and you may need to return some of your Grant to us.

If the total Project cost increases during the course of the Project, we will only consider increasing your Grant in exceptional circumstances. In this case you will have to provide further information.

Project update

When you are ready to claim the first instalment of your Grant you will need to submit a Project Update with your Payment Request. When we process the Legal Agreement, we will agree with you how many Project Updates we expect you to provide throughout the delivery of your Project.

We will monitor the progress of your Project to confirm that it is delivering the Outcomes identified in your Application and the Approved Purposes set out in your Legal Agreement. In between submitting your Project Update, it is important that you keep us informed of progress in reaching key milestones, for example appointment of contractors or staff, or issues arising so that we can respond and support you as appropriate.

You will also need to send us:

  • photographs showing the progress of your Project (mandatory)
  • a record of activities or events that you have arranged (mandatory)
  • job descriptions/details of recruitment (mandatory if applicable)
  • procurement reports (mandatory if applicable)

Payment Request

When you have invoices or receipts to demonstrate your Project expenditure you will need to submit a Payment Request with your Project Update in order to request a payment of your Grant.

You will also need to send us:

  • project invoices received during the reporting period (mandatory)
  • table of costs for amounts of less than £500 (mandatory if applicable)

When you submit your first Payment Request, you will need to complete the Tell us your bank details form and send us a copy of a recent bank statement, paying in slip or cheque.

Your bank account name must match the name of the organisation in your Application.

We aim to release your Grant within 10 working days of receiving your completed form and supporting documents.

Completion Report and Final Payment Request

Once your Project is complete you must send us the Completion Report and Final Payment Request. This form will allow you to claim the final payment of your Grant (up to 10%). We recommend that you do this as soon as you can gather all the information together and while the Project is still fresh in your mind.

Please let us know when you have finished or are about to finish your project so we can send you the Completion Report and Final Payment Request.

This form must be submitted within three months of completing your Project. If we do not receive the report within this timescale, we may withhold your final Grant payment or ask for the repayment of some or all of your Grant.

By complete we mean:

  • your Project is finished, and you have achieved your Approved Purposes
  • you have acknowledged your Grant and promoted The National Lottery
  • you have a Practical Completion Certificate (for Projects that have undertaken capital works)
  • you have evaluated your Project and created a report
  • you can supply high resolution digital Project photographs and proof of acknowledgment of our funding
  • you have listed the project’s Digital Outputs and provided the web address (URL) of the website or websites where they can be accessed

Please note that we will not make your final payment until we have received and reviewed all the required information including your Evaluation Report.

Once you have made your final Grant request, we will not accept any further requests for payments from you. You should therefore agree your final accounts with your contractors and suppliers before you apply for the final Grant payment.

We will continue to keep in contact with you at intervals after the Project is completed including through our customer surveys.

Projects completing under budget

If you spend less than your agreed costs and your Project completes under budget you will need to return any Grant that has not been spent to us. If the underspend is less than 10% of your Grant we will adjust the final payment of your Grant accordingly.

If the underspend exceeds 10% of your Grant you will need to return the unspent Grant to us through BACS transfer (bank details are available upon request). Your final payment will be calculated based on your overall Project costs and the Grant Percentage.

Worked example:

  • Total Project costs are £140,000, your organisation is contributing £20,000 from reserves and your Grant is £120,000. The Grant Percentage is therefore 86% (Grant divided by total Project costs).

If your Project completes under budget, we will adjust your final payment accordingly and you may need to return part of your Grant to us based on the Grant Percentage.

Worked example:

  • If your Project is £5,000 under budget and your total evidenced spend is £135,000, then based on the Grant Percentage of 86% your Grant would be adjusted to £116,100. Therefore, your final payment would be adjusted from £12,000 to £8,100.

Project Completion Date and duration of Grant Contract

The formal Project Completion Date is the date of the correspondence we will send you at the end of your Project letting you know that we have received all the necessary documentation to record your Project as complete.

Your Grant Contract states the duration that the Grant Contract will apply to your Project. During this time,  you must maintain your ongoing Project commitments. These start once we have processed your Legal Agreement and may last for a number of years after your Project completes, depending on the nature of your Project.

  • Activity (for example an exhibition and/or event with no Digital Outputs): the Grant Contract ends on the Project Completion Date.
  • Capital (for example new building or restoration works): 20 years after the Project Completion Date.
  • Digital Outputs (for example the creation of a website): five years from the Project Completion Date. If the lead applicant is a private owner of heritage, the Grant Contract will last for 10 years from the Project Completion Date.
  • Acquisition: if your Project includes buying a heritage item, land or building, the terms of the Grant Contract will last indefinitely. If you wish to dispose of what you have bought in future, you must ask for our permission and we may claim back all or part of your Grant (see Appendix A for more information).

A delay in submitting your Completion Report and Final Payment Request will extend the duration of the Grant Contract.

Appendix A: property ownership

Ownership

We expect you to own any Property (land, buildings, heritage items or intellectual property) on which you spend your Grant. If you do not meet our ownership requirements, you will need to improve your rights.

Land and buildings – for capital works

You must either own the freehold or have a lease which meets the following requirements:

  • your lease must have 20 years left to run after the Project Completion Date
  • we do not accept leases with break clauses (these give one or more parties to the lease the right to end the lease in certain circumstances)
  • we do not accept leases with forfeiture on insolvency clauses (these give the landlord the right to end the lease if the tenant becomes insolvent)
  • you must be able to sell on, sublet the whole or part and mortgage your lease but if we award you a Grant, you must first have our permission to do any of these

Land or buildings in third party ownership

Land/buildings in third party ownership: if a third party owns the land (which may include a project partner) we will either require them to sign up to the Grant Contract directly with us or require you to enter into a legally binding agreement with the owner. See Appendix B.

Acquisitions of land or buildings

If your Project involves buying land or buildings, you must buy them freehold or with a lease with at least 99 years left to run.

Heritage items

For Projects involving buying a heritage item or carrying out conservation work to a heritage item (for example, a steam train or a painting), you must buy or own the item outright.

We cannot fund private individuals or for-profit organisations to buy buildings, land or heritage items.

If you are borrowing item/s as part of your Project (for example, for an exhibition) and are asked to contribute towards the costs of conservation, then we may accept this cost if it forms a small part of your Project. The owners of the item/s may need to be tied into your partnership agreement or tied into the Grant Contract if a Grant is awarded. Contact us to talk about this if you think this will apply to your Project.

If your capital building Project is for the purpose of storing or displaying a collection that you do not own, we will require the owner of the collection to be tied into the Grant Contract if a Grant is awarded. Contact us to discuss this if you think this will apply to your Project.

Digital Outputs

We have specific requirements, which are set out in your Grant Contract, for ‘digital outputs’ produced as part of any The National Lottery Heritage Fund Project. We are using the term ‘digital output’ to cover anything you create in your Project in a digital format which is designed to give access to heritage and/or to help people engage with and learn about heritage. For example, this includes photographs, text, software, web and app content, databases, 3D models, sound and video recordings.

Items created in the management of the project, for example emails between team members and records of meetings, are not included in the requirement.

All Digital Outputs must be:

  • ‘Available’ (i.e. the outputs are freely available online, copies of the digital files are held securely and you can give access to these on demand) – for five years from the project completion date.
  • ‘Usable’ – the outputs function as intended and are kept up-to-date.
  • ‘Open’ – Digital Outputs are licensed for use by others under the Creative Commons ‘Attribution 4.0 International (CC-BY 4.0) licence, with the exception of code and metadata, which should be released under a Public Domain Dedication, unless we have agreed otherwise.

There is more information about our licensing requirements for projects on our website.

We expect:

  • websites to meet at least W3C Single A accessibility standard
  • you to use open data, software and services where possible
  • you to contribute Digital Outputs to appropriate heritage collections and open knowledge projects

Appendix B: land in third party ownership

For natural and landscape Projects

Where the land which is the subject of your Grant is owned by a third party or multiple third parties, agreements should be put in place between the Grantee and each land owner. There is no prescribed form of agreement, but we have specific requirements which should be included in any third party land owner agreements. At a minimum, the land owner agreements should include the following:

  1. details of the parties
  2. confirmation as to how the land is held (freehold or leasehold)
  3. a description of the Property (including plans)
  4. covenants on the part of the land owner to maintain the land and provide public access in accordance with the terms of the Grant (as applicable)
  5. a provision that any onward disposal should be subject to the third-party agreement
  6. that the agreement will last for 10 years following the Project Completion Date

You will need to provide us with copies the landowner agreements to ensure compliance with these requirements. The land owner agreements will need to be completed and in place before any Grant monies are released for work on each plot of land owned by a third party.

For capital works to built heritage, such as buildings, ornamental gardens

If your Project involves substantial work to a heritage building which is owned by a third party, we will usually expect the owner to become a joint Grantee or to Grant you a lease which meets our requirements (as set out above). In some situations, rather than join in the owner we may ask them to sign a side letter which we will prepare.

Community Grants

You may wish to make Community Grants payments to third party owners (including private owners) for activities and capital works that contribute to achieving Project Outcomes. If you are the lead applicant, you are responsible for making sure that the specific Project Outcomes are delivered by third party landowners (the Community Grantees). Also, that the Grant Contract is complied with, including repayment of the Grant if necessary.

This should be formalised through third-party agreements that define the Outcomes to be delivered on third party land and secure the management and maintenance of capital works. This is from the expected date of the works’ completion, until 10 years after the Project Completion Date. This should be a legal agreement between you and the Community Grantee.

Legal costs

You may include the costs of adapting and setting up any third-party agreements, including the cost of taking legal advice, as part of the costs in your Application.

Appendix C: invoices submitted with Payment Requests

All invoices submitted to us as evidence of spend should be clear, legible, and be for eligible works against the Approved Purposes we have agreed to fund. They must include the following information for us to be able to pay against them. They should be clear enough to read and not  damaged or tampered with.

They must all relate to works agreed to be funded by us and the client named on them should be the organisation submitting the payment.

Invoices must have:

  • an invoice number
  • the date they were raised
  • the date payment is expected and the payment terms
  • how payment is made and to who
  • company details, including name, address, email address, telephone number, company number, VAT registration number (if VAT registered)
  • a description of the services provided
  • the gross (without VAT), VAT amount if VAT registered and the net (total) amount due

Appendix D: glossary of terms

Application – your completed Application form and any documents or information you send us to support your request for a Grant.

Application Guidance – the document setting out the scope of the programme and how to apply.

Approved Purposes – the Approved Purposes summarise the Project described in your Application.

Funder – the Trustees of the National Heritage Memorial Fund who administer The National Lottery Heritage Fund.

Grant – the amount we have awarded you for your Project.

Grant Contract – made up of:

  • ‘Check your Project details’
  • terms and conditions
  • any Additional Grant Conditions, if applicable
  • Standard Terms of Grant
  • Receiving a Grant guidance
  • your Application

Grant Expiry Date – the date by which you must complete the Project.

Grant Percentage – Grant divided by total Project costs.

Legal Agreement – the process you must complete to check and agree your Grant. This includes checking your Project details (including the Grant, Approved Purposes and Grant Expiry Date) and agreeing the Grant Contract.

Open licence – an open licence grants permission to access, re-use and redistribute a work with few or no restrictions. There are various open licences available but the default open licence required is the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0) licence, or equivalent.

Outcomes – we describe the difference we want to make with our funding through a set of nine Outcomes. Outcomes are changes, impacts or benefits that happen as a direct result of your Project. All of the Projects we fund will achieve one or more of these Outcomes.

Project – the purposes we have approved as set out in the Application (taking account of any changes we and you have agreed in writing up to the date of our decision to award you the Grant and any changes that we tell you about in the Legal Agreement). These purposes are sometimes described as Approved Purposes and include you getting and using partnership funding as set out in the Application and how you said you would use the Property (if any).

Project Completion Date – the date of the letter we send you letting you know that the Project is recorded as complete. Note that this will be after the date by which you have completed all work on the Project.

Property – land, buildings, heritage items or intellectual property which will benefit from your Grant.

We, us, our – means Funder.

You, your – means the Grant Recipient/Grantee.

Guidance updates

We will regularly review this guidance and respond to user feedback. We reserve the right to make changes as required. We will communicate any changes as quickly as possible via this webpage.

Changes

13 April 2023: Substantial edits were made so that this guidance supports users of our new grant management system. The old system has now closed. 

These updates include:

  • removal of text related to the old grant management system, including what steps users should take to complete our old application forms
  • removal of processes that related to our old system, for example the posting of grant notification letters 
  • updating of language and terminology so that it matches our new system