Finance

Two women shake hands and smile at each other. One is a workplace chaplain.

Whether you are a church leader, a PCC Treasurer, or have another role on your church’s PCC, you’ll have financial responsibilities and decisions to make on behalf of your church.

The Finance Team provides all the accounting services for the Diocese and is here to support you and your parish steward your parish funds effectively. They can offer guidance around accounting regulations and methods of book-keeping.

Alongside this, they undertake the record keeping of all Diocesan Board of Finance (DBF) financial activities, the management of diocesan cash and investment assets, the monitoring of diocesan income and expenditure, the preparation of various management accounts and the completion of statutory annual financial statements for the DBF.

On this page we cover the information you need to help you manage your parish finances:

Parish Offer
Support for treasurers
Parish Returns
Fees
Forms, information and guidance
Events and training

We also have separate pages on:

Giving
Grants
How mission and ministry is funded - The Common Fund

Parish offer

Our shared Called Together vision expresses our ambition to meet our ministry and mission needs, and the challenges we face, as a family of faith. Supporting each other means pooling our resources and sharing costs too.

We do this through The Common Fund - the common pot of money paid into by congregations across the Diocese.

The Parish Offer is the formal pledge made by a parish as its contribution for the ensuing year towards the Common Fund. The amount a parish pays into the Common Fund is calculated via a formula.
The Indicative Offer is the result of this formula. Indicative Offers are provided to parishes to support their decisions when considering the pledged level of the Offer they will make, based on the cost of ministry and the overall funding requirement of the whole Diocese for mission and ministry.

More about the Parish and Indicative Offer system

The Parish Offer system is based on principles of relationship, trust, mutual commitment and freewill offering, coupled with the responsibility for ministry in one’s own place. It recognises that all giving is a freewill response to the generosity of God related both to opportunity and need. There are three key reasons why the Parish Offer was introduced:

to be open about the voluntary nature of all giving (just as congregational giving to parishes is voluntary);
to ensure there could be clergy in all parts of the Diocese, not just those able to afford their own minister(s); and
to encourage generosity from those parishes which are better off, to support those which are struggling.

The principal income stream of the Diocese as a whole (representing 88% of income) is derived from voluntary giving from the parishes. This is in the form of Parish Offers that are made following the publishing of the Budget for the forthcoming year and historically with guidance for annual growth in pledges from Diocesan Synod. Parish Offers are essential to the mission of the church in the whole Diocese; without it, clergy and parishes cannot be supported in their mission. Accordingly, we ask parishes to make a pledge that is challenging, realistic and generous.

Useful documents and links:

Indicative Offers
Indicative Offers - FAQs
How mission and ministry is funded - The Common Fund
Explanation of IO Schedule 2022

Support for treasurers

The Diocese of Rochester is a member of the Association of Church Accountants and Treasurers (ACAT).

Membership gives all church treasurers access to resources, support and training on the ACAT website. For access to the Members' Area, please email finance@rochester.anglican.org for the current password.

Parish Returns

This system allows church representatives to submit their annual Return of Parish Finance and Statistics for Mission via the internet.

Useful links:
Statistics for Mission
Online Parish Returns Website
A user's guide to the Church of England's online Parish Return System

Fees

Detailed guidance on parochial fees can be found in The Guide to Church of England Parochial Fees. The current table of fees and returns forms can be found below:

DBF Fees Summary
Payments to Clergy on Jury Service

2024 fees

2024 Parochial Fees
2024 Parochial Fees A4 full
Rochester Quarterly Fee Return 2024
Summary of Parochial Fees (inc. Retired PTO) 2024
Occasional Duty Fees 2024

2025 fees

2025 Parochial Fees
2025 Parochial Fees Rochester Diocese
Occasional Duty Fees 2025
Rochester_Quarterly_Fee_Return_2025
Summary of Parochial Fees (inc. Retired PTO) 2025

Forms, information, and guidance

Here we've collated all the forms, information and guidance materials to help you with your parish finances, as well as broader questions you may have about Diocesan finances. Please choose a category below:

Forms and templates

Weekly Accounting Sheet
Expense Claim Form

Information

Annual Report and Accounts 2020
Diocesan Budget 2021 - presentation for Synod
Synod motion on the 2021 Budget
Budget presentation for Treasurers' Conference 2022

Guidance

Indicative Offers - FAQs
A guide to Independent Examinations
Checklist of documents that needed to go to your Independent Examiner
A guide to the Church Repair Fund and Diocesan Loan Fund
Parish VAT Guide
Year End Procedures
Companion Dioceses Financial Guidelines
Summary of Companion Diocese Financial Guidelines for PCC treasurers.

If you were unable to find what you were looking for, please contact the Finance Team or email: finance@rochester.anglican.org

Events and training

Throughout the year, the team also provides regular training events and information for parish treasurers. All events will be listed on the Events and Training page.