On 9 September 2026, the Charity Commission said it had concluded its investigations into four charities drawn into its statutory class inquiry on cheque-cashing controls. The completed cases concern The Z.S.V. Trust, Bnois Jerusalem Schools, Forty Limited and Friends Of Yeshiva Daas Sholem Shotz. The regulator's engagement with those four charities has now ended, but the wider class inquiry remains open. Other charities are still being examined as the Commission reviews evidence and decides what further regulatory action, if any, is required.
The wider inquiry began in May 2025 after the Commission identified 105 charities that had issued cheques later exchanged for cash, with a combined value of £22 million, between December 2021 and March 2023. According to the regulator, charities entered the inquiry in tranches rather than through a single enforcement step. That context is important. The latest announcement is not a standalone case but one completed part of a broader investigation into whether trustee oversight and financial controls were sufficient where large sums were moved through cash-based transactions.
In the four concluded cases, the Commission found evidence that open cheques had been issued during the period under review. At the same time, it said it was satisfied that each charity was carrying out charitable activities in line with its stated purposes. The Commission nevertheless recorded findings of misconduct and/or mismanagement in all four cases. Its reasoning is that blank or open cheques are high-risk instruments and do not provide the level of control over charitable spending that trustees are expected to maintain.
The regulator's definitions are narrow but important. A blank cheque is signed while both the payee and the amount remain uncompleted. An open cheque is signed with the amount entered but the payee left blank. In each case, the concern is the lack of a clear payment trail at the point the cheque is authorised. The four cases therefore set out a practical distinction in the Commission's compliance approach. A charity may be pursuing genuine charitable purposes, but that does not remove the trustees' duty to keep expenditure subject to proper authorisation, identifiable recipients and dependable records.
Since the investigations began, all four charities have told the Commission that blank and open cheques are no longer used. For the charities that remain in operation, the regulator has issued Regulatory Action Plans intended to address governance weaknesses and strengthen internal financial controls. The Commission also said it provided trustees with regulatory advice and guidance on how their charities should be run. It added that information arising from the inquiry has been exchanged with other government departments.
One of the four cases ended differently from the others. Before the inquiry formally opened, Friends Of Yeshiva Daas Sholem Shotz had appointed an entirely new trustee board, and that board concluded the charity could not continue operating. Following engagement with the trustees, the Commission assisted with the wind-up process. The charity has since been removed from the public register, and the former trustees were given advice and guidance on their responsibilities should they seek appointment to another charity in future.
The Commission describes a statutory inquiry as a formal legal power that allows it to investigate serious regulatory concerns and, where necessary, use protective powers in relation to a charity's beneficiaries, assets or reputation. It also repeats an important procedural point: the opening of an inquiry is not, by itself, a finding of wrongdoing. For the wider sector, the completed cases show how the regulator is approaching control failures in practice. The Charity Commission accepted that charitable activity was taking place, but still found misconduct or mismanagement where payment processes fell below the standard expected of trustees. The Commission has published a report on these four cases on GOV.UK, while the broader class inquiry continues.