An anti-poverty charity that has failed to file its accounts over a number of years is to be investigated by the Charity Commission.

Essex based Destiny Community Services was set up in 2015 to prevent and provide relief from poverty to those in the Dagenham area.

But in 2024 it was entered into the regulator’s double defaulter inquiry for failing to file accounts for the years ending December 2021 and 2022.

While accounts for the year ending December 2021 have now been filed, this remains its last accounts on record with the regulator, after the charity fell “further into default of its accounting requirements”.

In launching a statutory inquiry into the running of the charity, the regulator raises concerns that “it has failed to engage meaningfully” with its officials.

It also failed to fully comply with an official order raised by the regulator as part of its double defaulter inquiry.

The statutory investigation will look at whether the trustees have complied, and are complying, with their legal duties in the running of the charity.

Their compliance with statutory accounting and reporting responsibilities and whether there has been any “unauthorised private benefit to the trustees and/or connected parties including whether conflicts of interest have been properly managed” will also be looked at.

Its accounts for December 2021 show its spending was £191,605, however its income over this period was £170,285. It is listed as having three trustees and eight volunteers working for the charity.

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