THREE COUNTIES DOG RESCUE ANNUAL REPORT 2016-2017

High Park Cottage, Kirkby Underwood Road, Aslackby, Sleaford, Lincolnshire. NG34 0HP

 

Officers           The officers and trustees of the Society are:

Chairman/Head of Three Counties & trustee            :           Mrs. G. R. Mauchline

Secretary/Treasurer & trustee:                                  Mr. M. J. Mauchline

Trustee:                                                                       Mrs. Andrea Andrew

Trustee:                                                                       Mrs. Louise Donschak

Trustee:                                                                       Mrs. Annabel Holland Wing

 

Aims of the Society

Three Counties Dog Rescue has as its aims “to accept, care for, and find homes for unwanted, lost and stray dogs”.

Statement of Public Benefit

 

 For the benefit of the public to relieve the suffering of dogs and cats in need of care and attention and, in particular, to provide and maintain rescue homes or other facilities for the reception, care and treatment of such animals.

Summary of the year’s achievements

We

  • passed a milestone of 6500 dogs and cats whose lives we have improved since our formation in 1972, including a record 258 in this period.
  • reconstituted Three Counties as a Charitable Incorporated Organisation (CIO).
  • formed a trading company 3CDR Trading Ltd to manage the charity shop finances.
  • neutered 42% more animals than last year
  • financed a doubling of pets needing treatment costing over £1000 each

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Charity Organisational structures

Through the year we reconstituted Three Counties Dog Rescue as a “Charitable Incorporated Institution” and updated the constitution and aims of Three Counties. It had been over thirty five years since the original charity was created and changes were necessary to meet the way Three Counties has developed.

On the advice of our tax advisers we also set up 3CDR Trading Ltd to account for income and expenditure from the shop and other trading activity.

Total fees for this work amounted to £4800

Rehoming

We improved the lives of 258 dogs and cats in the year. This compares with 206 last year, itself a record at the time and representing a 72% increase since 2010.

Our band of volunteer supporters, regularly come to the kennels to exercise, socialise and encourage the dogs in our care. Some dogs arrive at the kennels in a traumatised  condition and our team spends one to one time with them until they are restored to a happy and relaxed state and ready for re-homing. This requires infinite patience but successful outcomes are very rewarding.

We looked after an average of 53 dogs and 2 cats at the kennels though the year and have a growing number of dogs and cats in foster care in addition. During the year dog numbers in the kennels peaked at 60 and cats at 5. We never had less than 47 dogs in the kennels.

The 25% increase in dogs in the kennels combined  with an increase in boarding fees had an inevitable impact on related costs. We experienced a particular increase in lurchers coming to the Rescue as a consequence of the fall out from hare coursing.

The considerable expenditure needed to bring dogs and cats that come to us, back to full health have meant vet costs continued to rise. Rising costs were also driven by the growing number of elderly dogs in long term foster homes and those in the kennels.

The real cost per dog and cat re-homed (largely comprising kennel and veterinary costs) rose slightly to £863 but has not changed markedly despite the increase in kennelling costs.

(2016: £845, 2015: £987, 2014: £885, 2013: £947 2012: £767, 2011 £804).  Three Counties continues its policy of not destroying a dog or cat unless its quality of life makes it fairer to do so, or it is a danger to staff and volunteers, but this leads to the growing number of older dogs are with us in the kennels and in foster care.

                                                                                                                                                           

Veterinary activity

136 animals were neutered in the period (2016: 118), 225 animals fully vaccinated (2016:133) 465 separate vaccinations – 2016: 337) and 74 micro-chipped at the veterinary centre (2016: 56).

We have all the animals coming into our care checked by our Vet and often they have ailments that need attention. The cost of this care is a major part of our expenditure.

Special cases

Every year we spend large amounts restoring dogs and cats to full health before re-homing them. The veterinary care costs for nineteen animals in 2016 exceeded £1000 (2015: ten).The costs for these represented around 22% of the total vet costs in that year.

 

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Annual Expenditure

Expenditure (net of VAT recovery) relating to the period April 2016/March 2017 was £261,300. (2016: £189,484). A full year of shop costs accounts for some of the difference but increased kennel fees and veterinary costs accounted for the majority.

 This expenditure was split:    Boarding fees              £104,295         (2016: £83068)

                                                Veterinary fees           £106,683         (2016: £82323)

                                                Advertising fees          £  5,289           (2016: £5051)

                                                Miscellaneous             £  7,625           (2016: £3237)

                                                Charity shop costs       £37,308           (2016: £15805)

As in previous years all expenditure on administration, travel, telephone calls etc. was borne by the trustees and the helpers. For the management team alone hours devoted to dog and cat rescue continue to amount to at least 6000 per annum. We estimate the absorbed travel costs for them at £9,000 per annum and an estimated 600 outbound telephone calls are made each month.

All our volunteers are unpaid and cover their own travel costs, in some cases quite substantial. We have teams of volunteers who

  • help at the kennels, with rehoming, transport, home checks and vet manage the website, our facebook page, twitter and instagram accounts
  • deal with collections in all weathers at sites around our  area
  • work in the charity shop
  • foster dogs and cats for us

It goes without saying that the Rescue could not function without the support of these dedicated people.

Annual Income

The Charity Shop

Our first full year of trading at our shop has been a learning experience but has contributed almost £10,000 to our rescue funds. Once we decided to open for six days a week it was clear that we needed to employ staff, one who does five days and one who does one day. A team of volunteers are vital to support them. Donations of items for sale have been plentiful through the year.

Sales/collections and events raised £20,750 (2016 – £26,500). Marjorie Briggs stood down from her role of collections organiser after many years in the role. She has been a  tremendous supporter and continues to help as a collector. The collecting team, now run by Judy Caunt and Penny Wright weighed in with their customary five figure contribution. Last year we benefitted from being M&S Springfields Charity of the year and this accounts for the difference in totals collected.

Payments for dogs and cats rose to £24,633 (2016: £18350) alongside the increased numbers rehomed.

Donations, including those made through the “Sponsor a Dog” scheme, grew to £43,380.      

(2016: £39600):

The “Sponsor a Dog” scheme had 37 sponsors including 27 regular donors to the scheme during the year. Together with these regular donors we now have a total of 77 supporters making monthly donations giving us a welcome regular income.

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Petplan Commission

Commission from acting as an “introducer” for Petplan insurance continues to grow annually and amounted to £2,231 before VAT (2016: £1,784).

Easyfundraising

We promote the use of easyfundraising.org when people buy goods online. If they go through this site we get a small donation without increasing the cost to the purchaser. This income is growing slowly, quarter by quarter, from this source and contributes close to £800.

Legacies

We received a bequest of £1000. (Last year we received three bequests totalling £53,000). This is obviously an unpredictable source of funds but one from which the well known animal charities benefit in a major way.

We continue to promote our leaflet, aimed at prompting people to think about what will happen to their pets if they pass away before them. It includes a section inviting supporters to consider leaving Three Counties something in their will after their families have been catered for.

2016 Calendar

Together with the photo competition and calendar sponsors, calendar sale profits amount to almost £500

Charitable Grants and Corporate support

We were grateful for the continued grant support from Lush (£3000), Spaywatch (£1250) and the Jean Plowright Trust (£1000).

We also benefitted from corporate donations from Mars UK (£2000), M&S (£990), Petplan (£500), Waitrose green disc scheme (£300) and N&P (£100).

Communications

Our website continues to receive many positive comments and a further 1.5 million hits this year means that it has received more than two and a half millions visits since its creation.

Facebook membership has climbed to more than 4000 and provides a rich source of entertainment from photos of the escapades of dogs rehomed and of those going off with their new owners.

Our mailing list now tops 900 supporters receiving occasional newsletters. (Any supporters who do not think they are on the mailing list should email us at info@threecountiesdogrescue.org to request inclusion).

Business procedures and practices

We maintain:

  • A disaster recovery plan
  • A training programme and record for helpers at the kennels
  • A complaints procedure
  • A vulnerable persons procedure.

and retain our membership of the Association of Dog and Cats homes and the Federation of small businesses.

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Partnerships

We continue to enjoy the benefits of our partnership with Burghley Veterinary Centre through discounted fees and through the use of their premises for sales, printing leaflets and documents.

It is reassuring to use a practice with dedicated and supportive staff who provide a twenty four hour care service on the premises.                                                        

Outlook

We are exploring ways to enable us to buy the kennels we have used for many years. This would enable us to create more opportunities to raise income for the Charity and to control expenditure on kennelling our rescue dogs and cats. It is an essential part of developing our plans for sustaining the work of Three Counties Dog Rescue into the long term future.

We have already made changes in the last twelve months to set us up for future years but all this work puts an increasing strain on the limited resources we can call on. We are always on the look out for new volunteers to help with fundraising and managing the shop but adding volunteers with legal and financial skills would be an enormous benefit. Let us know if you think you might be able to help on any of these fronts.

I must always finish with a great vote of thanks to our committed group of volunteers, supporting the Rescue work, fundraising for us and helping to run the Charity shop. They remain our greatest strength and our gratitude and that of all the animals, whose welfare we continue to look after, goes to them.

 

 

  1. R. Mauchline

Chairman – Three Counties Dog Rescue

1st June 2017

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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