General Questions
The actual ratio of successful to unsuccessful applications changes regularly. We receive many more funding requests than we can support and, like most grant-making organisations, have to turn down a considerable number of the applications we consider.
We received 45 applications in our most recent grant round (final decisions made: July 2025) and awarded 12 grants, making an overall success rate of around 1 in 4.
The size of each grant is decided by the Trustees and usually ranges from £15,000 to £30,000 a year for up to 3 years (most grants awarded will be at £20,000 or £25,000 a year).
We don’t ask you to request a particular amount or term when completing the application form. However, it is the Trust’s preference to offer multi-year grants and we tend to do this wherever possible.
We provide unrestricted funding to small specialist organisations whose work falls within our specific grants programmes. We do not fund projects. We usually fund work being carried out by established organisations and would want to see strong evidence-based proposals for any new approaches or ways of working.
We give unrestricted funding to specialist small and medium sized organisations whose work fits within our grant programme criteria. We do not provide project funding.
The Bromley Trust is accredited with the Living Wage Foundation as a Living Wage Funder. We aim to promote the Real Living Wage and the benefits of the scheme amongst our applicants and grantees, as well as to other Funders and partners. We understand that many of the charities we support may not currently be able to pay all of their staff the National or London Living Wage. This does not mean that you cannot receive a grant from the Trust – we do not stipulate in our grant conditions that you must be a Living Wage Employer. We will discuss your situation with you during our grant assessment and monitoring stages.
Yes, you can view the questions below although please make sure you submit any application via our online form and complete the eligibility quiz to ensure you are eligible before you start drafting your answers
Process Questions
The link to our application form can be found at the end of the eligibility quiz on the Apply for Funding page. If this hyperlink doesn’t work, please copy and paste it into your browser. If you experience any problems, please contact us.
All applications need to be made via our online application form. Please contact us if you are having any difficulties with the form.
Trustees make grants twice a year, at their February and July Board meetings. The application deadlines will usually be in September and March.
The timetable for the next round of applications is published here: Our process – The Bromley Trust
It takes around 4 months to hear of a successful decision, but applicants which are not shortlisted for a full assessment will hear much sooner (usually within a month of the application deadline date).
The timetable for decision-making is published here: Our process – The Bromley Trust
You will receive an automated email acknowledging receipt of your online application. After this you should not expect to hear from us again until we let you know whether or not your application has been short-listed for a visit. The timetable for decision-making is published here: Our process – The Bromley Trust
Due to limited resources we are only able to meet with applicants who have been short-listed or with our current grantees. If you have a question about applying to the Trust then please look at the relevant section of our website first to see if your query can be answered there.
If you still need to get in touch after, please email us at enquiries@thebromleytrust.org.uk and we’ll be happy to help. We try to reply to emails within two weeks. Unfortunately we don’t have the resources to reply to general appeals as we are a very small team.
No, we are unable to comment on draft applications ahead of them being submitted but are happy to answer any specific questions you have by email.
We offer feedback to those applicants that reached the final stage of our assessment process but were not ultimately awarded a grant.
Unfortunately we do not have the resources to provide bespoke feedback to organisations that are not short-listed. However you can see the most common reasons why applications were unsuccessful here. We will update this page after each grant round.
Our Director (sometimes accompanied by our Grants Manager or a Trustee) will usually meet with all short-listed applicants to discuss the application in more detail. This often involves a visit to your office or the site where you deliver services.
Eligibility Questions
For details of our exclusions please look at the ‘Our criteria’ page of the website.
You should allow two years from being notified of an unsuccessful outcome before re-applying. Please also check our website to ensure that your organisation still meets our eligibility criteria at the time of re-applying.
We accept applications from across the UK, for work which takes place within the UK.
No, we don’t have any grant-making schemes for individuals and unfortunately don’t have the resources to reply to any such funding requests.
We can only accept applications from UK registered charities.
We do not accept applications from charities which are newly established and have less than a year’s accounts. If your organisation is a newly established charity but used to exist as a project within another organisation or as a different entity such as a Community Interest Company (CIC) then you are welcome to send us an email to double-check your eligibility.
We usually only fund organisations with an annual income above £100k. If there is an exceptional reason for your income being outside of this criteria and you would like to double-check your eligibility then please contact us.
We usually only give unrestricted funding to organisations with an annual turnover of under £1.2m under our open grants programmes. If there is an exceptional reason for your income being outside of this criteria and you would like to double-check your eligibility then please contact us.
We usually only accept applications from charities that have unrestricted reserves totaling between one month’s and one year’s worth of expenditure. If there is an exceptional reason for your current level of reserves being outside of this criteria and you would like to double-check your eligibility then please contact us.
We do not fund projects or respond to general appeals.