2020 Church Fees are published

These 'Parochial Fees' are the charges set by the General Synod and Parliament for certain occasional offices conducted by the Church. They are listed on a special Fees Table that is updated and republished every year.

While Baptisms are always offered at no charge, there is often a fee for the issuing of a Baptism Certificate and for replacement certificates issued at a later stage.

There is a list of fees relating to marriages, with everything from the publication of banns of marriage to the service itself.

The fees for funerals and burials of persons aged 16 years or more, including a service in church and the burial of a body or cremated remains with or without a service are also listed.

The fees cover monuments in Churchyards that are permitted in accordance wih rules, regulations or directions made by the Chancellor including those relating to a particular churchyard or part of a churchyard.

Finally the fees cover searches of church registers, for marraiges, baptisms or burials.

The Fees are broken down into the those paid to the Diocese and those paid to the local PCC.

The diocesan fees are built up from assumptions about the costs of ministry and the likely number of hours needed to provide a good ministry for the particular service, while the PCC fees include a location or building element - based on national statistics for the overall costs of repairs and maintenance of church buildings and the number of hours in use - and an element for administrative staffing based on a secretarial rate of pay.

Parochial fees are legally payable and if there are no ‘extras’, the parochial fee for the relevant service is the fee that should be charged.

PCC fees for burials and monuments include an element to provide for long-term maintenance of the churchyard.

Heating of the church and the cost of deploying vergers are not covered by the statutory fees, and so PCCs are able to charge for these items as ‘extras’, decided locally, if the person paying the fees wishes to have them.

The incumbent or priest-in-charge of the benefice concerned can have a right of waiver, after consultation with the churchwardens for PCC fees. However, an incumbent or priest-in-charge cannot waive fees generally. They may only be waived “in a particular case”.

The full set of 2019 and 2020 fees can be downloaded from the ‘Life Events’ section of the Church of England website, here.

The table is available in A3 and A4 format and there is also a short summary document.

The Salisbury Diocese 2020 Quarterly Fees spreadsheet and Bishop’s Guidelines will be published on the Salisbury Diocese in early December 2019.