How we score trust.
Donors deserve to know which NGOs are actually well-run. Our trust score is auto-computed from compliance, governance, financial, and donor signals. Here's exactly what we look at.
Open formula. No paid placements. No hidden weights.
The four categories
Every NGO is graded out of 100 across four weighted categories. The weights have been calibrated so an NGO needs strong compliance and governance to clear 75 - a clean compliance record alone caps out around 60–70.
Compliance
40%Statutory registrations and filings every Indian NGO must keep current.
- 12A / 12AB registration renewed and active
- 80G registration valid (donors can claim tax exemption)
- FCRA active & FC-6 filed on time (if applicable)
- Last Form 10BD donor return filed within 12 months
- CSR-1 registered and current (if accepting corporate funds)
- Statutory audit completed for the latest FY
- No overdue compliance tasks
Governance
25%Who's accountable, how decisions get made, and whether the paper trail exists.
- Active trustees / governing-board members on file
- Board meetings logged with minutes in the last 6 months
- Audit committee constituted
- Conflict-of-interest declarations collected annually
- Latest annual report uploaded to the evidence vault
Financials
25%Whether the money is being tracked, allocated, and audited - not just collected.
- Income & Expenditure statement on file for the last FY
- Receipts & Payments statement on file
- Bank reconciliation completed within the last 2 months
- Admin overhead below 20% of total spend
- Donation utilisation tagged to programs above 80%
- Receipt-issuance rate above 90% on paid donations
Donor signals
10%What donors actually experience after they give - speed, transparency, repeat-rate.
- Year-on-year donor retention (lapsed donors coming back)
- Active donor count above 50 in the last 12 months
- Receipts issued within 60 seconds of payment
- Recurring (SDP) donor base > 10 active plans
- Data-subject requests responded to within DPDP SLA
- No spike in donor complaints over the trailing 90 days
How scores map to tiers
Every NGO falls into one of four tiers based on its composite score. The tier shows up on the public profile, the registry feed, and donor-facing badges.
| Score | Tier | What it means |
|---|---|---|
| 80 – 100 | Gold | All four categories largely satisfied. Compliance + governance verified end-to-end. Donor experience instant. |
| 60 – 79 | Silver | Statutory boxes ticked, governance documentation present. Some financial or donor-experience signals need work. |
| 40 – 59 | Bronze | Registered and active, but several signals are missing - typically governance paper-trail or recent financials. |
| 0 – 39 | Under Review | Insufficient data or material gaps. Donations are still accepted, but donors should ask for the missing documents directly. |
Computation cadence
Scores are recomputed nightly at 03:00 IST and whenever an NGO updates a compliance field. NGOs can also request a manual recompute from their dashboard → Trust Score page, with a per-NGO rate limit to keep things sane.
Dispute process
If you believe the score is wrong - a registration we flagged as expired actually renewed, a filing we missed - raise a dispute from your NGO dashboard → Trust Score → Dispute. The compliance team reviews disputes within 5 business days and adjusts the signal source if confirmed.
Update history
We'll update this page whenever the formula changes. Past versions stay in the audit log so any score can be traced back to the rules in force when it was computed.