Community Interest Statement Examples: What the Regulator Accepts

The community interest statement is made on form CIC36, which you complete, have signed by every proposed director, and upload as a PDF when you register your CIC online. It has four sections:

• Section A, who benefits. A declaration that the company will carry on its activities for the benefit of the community, plus a short description of that community.
• Section B, activities and benefit. A two-column table: your day-to-day activities on the left, how each benefits the community on the right, plus how any surplus will be used.
• Section C, the political declaration. That the company will not be a political party, a political campaigning organisation, or a subsidiary of either.
• Section D, signatures. Every proposed director signs. The form warns: “If this section is not completed your application will be rejected.”

The statutory community interest test (section 35 of the 2004 Act) asks whether “a reasonable person might consider that its activities are being carried on for the benefit of the community”. Your “community” can be broad (residents of a town) or a defined section of it (young carers, refugees, people with a particular condition). The Regulator's guidance says any group sharing a readily identifiable characteristic can qualify.

The Regulator publishes a completed example CIC36 on gov.uk for a fictional company, “Premier Football Coaching Community Interest Company”. It is the single best model of the expected level of detail. Its Section A reads:

And a Section B activity row:

Notice what the official example does: it names the age range, the frequency, the price (free), the safeguards (qualified, DBS-checked coaches), and it contrasts the offer with for-profit provision. That is what the Regulator's instruction to “provide as much detail as possible” looks like in practice. The form's own footnote suggests community descriptions like “the residents of Oldtown” or “those suffering from XYZ disease”.

These are illustrations we have written following the structure of the Regulator's published example. They are not official text. Swap in your real details and keep the same specificity.

• Is the community specific and identifiable (place, group, or shared characteristic)?
• Does each activity name what you will actually do, how often, and for whom?
• Does each benefit follow from its activity, and differ from what a commercial provider offers?
• Does the surplus wording include “with the consent of the CIC Regulator” where needed?
• Does the community in Section A match the community in your articles' objects clause?
• Has every proposed director signed Section D, and is the company name identical everywhere?

CIC Tools turns your plain-English answers into a complete CIC36, correct sections, correct surplus wording, matched to your articles, ready to sign and upload. Free to start; £29 when you download. You submit to Companies House yourself and pay their £115 fee.