The Grassroots Money Model, Honestly Explained
Run the books for a junior football club and you quickly learn that the football is the easy part. The hard part is the money - and specifically, collecting small amounts of it from a lot of different people, every single week, for the whole season. If you have ever stood at the side of a pitch in the rain with a damp envelope of £1 coins, mentally ticking off who has paid and who has "forgotten my wallet again", this guide is for you.
Most grassroots clubs run two layers of income. First there is the annual or termly sub - a larger, one-off payment per child that covers your fixed costs for the season. Second there is the weekly fee - the classic "£3 in an envelope each week" for training and match days, which scales with how often a player actually turns up. Plenty of clubs run both: a sub to keep the lights on and a small weekly contribution on top. Understanding which costs belong in which bucket is the first step to setting a fair price.
Working Out What to Charge
The single biggest mistake new treasurers make is plucking a figure out of the air because "that's what we paid last year". Instead, cost the season properly. Add up everything the club genuinely has to spend, then divide by your expected number of players and the number of weeks you run. Here is the checklist of real costs that should feed into your sub.
How to Set Your Subs and Match Fees
- Pitch and 3G hire: Usually the biggest line by far. Grass pitches from the council, or a 3G astro slot for training - price it per session across the whole season, summer and winter.
- Referees: Match officials are paid per game in most leagues from U13 upwards. Multiply the fee by your number of home fixtures.
- League and County FA affiliation: Your annual affiliation to the County FA and your league entry fees are fixed costs every team pays before a ball is kicked.
- Kit and equipment: Match kit, training tops, footballs, bibs, cones, a goal net or two and a first-aid kit. Spread the cost of durable kit across the seasons it will last.
- Winter training venue: If you move indoors or onto a floodlit 3G in the dark months, that is often your most expensive period - budget for it separately.
- A small contingency: Build in a modest surplus for the unexpected - a damaged net, an extra friendly, or a hardship waiver for a family who needs one.
Once you have a total, divide it sensibly. A common approach is to put fixed costs - affiliation, league fees, kit - into the annual or termly sub, and variable costs - pitch hire and referees - into a weekly match fee that only applies when a player attends. That way a child who misses half the season for a long injury is not charged for matches they never played, while the club still covers its committed bills. Be transparent with parents about how the figure is built; people pay far more willingly when they can see it is fair and not a profit.
The Real Pain: Collecting It Every Week
Setting the price is the easy bit. Collecting it is where treasurers lose their evenings. Cash-and-coins football has a set of problems every volunteer knows by heart:
You are chasing money off busy parents at the worst possible moment - just before kick-off, when you are also trying to get the team out. Multiply that across three or four age groups and you have dozens of small payments to track, reconcile and bank. Coins go missing. Notes get lost. The spreadsheet falls behind. And there is always the awkwardness of asking the same family, again, for the £3 they owe from three weeks ago - in front of other parents. None of it is the club's fault; it is just the nature of collecting small sums from a crowd, by hand, in a car park.
This is exactly the kind of admin that drives good volunteers to quit. The good news is that almost all of it disappears the moment you move the money online and let the system do the chasing.
Why Digital Collection Fixes It
Moving subs and match fees to a digital club platform changes the job in three ways. First, the recurring money collects itself: set up a Direct Debit or scheduled payment and the annual or monthly sub arrives automatically, whether or not anyone remembers to ask. Second, the app does the nagging: automated reminders go out to anyone who has not paid, so the treasurer never has to send a personal chase. Third, the records are clean: every payment is logged against the right player automatically, so there is no shoebox of envelopes to reconcile and no spreadsheet to keep up to date by hand.
Crucially, going digital does not have to mean pricing anyone out. The best platforms make concessions easy to build in: sibling discounts so a family with two or three players is not penalised, the option to pay in instalments rather than one daunting lump sum, and a quiet route for hardship cases handled confidentially. The aim is that paying is so frictionless nobody has to be chased - and that the families who need a little help can ask for it without embarrassment.
Where Teamo Fits for the Treasurer
One option built for exactly this job is Teamo, the club app made by Sportplan - the same company behind this site, so weigh that as you read. It runs subs and match fees by Direct Debit at 2% + 20p, which at the time of writing is cheaper than card for recurring subs, with card at 2.5% + 20p available too. Its auto-pay bundling packages subs, match fees and event costs into a single payment, which saves paying the fixed 20p on every separate charge - a real difference when you are collecting lots of small weekly amounts. Payment status shows live on the team sheet at selection - a "no pay, no play" prompt that surfaces an unpaid balance when you pick the side rather than in an awkward touchline chat - and clubs using it collect the large majority of the subs they are owed. It does this privately, too: team managers see only a treasurer "traffic-light" health indicator, never who individually owes what. And payments post automatically to Xero, so there is nothing to reconcile by hand. If the cash tin has had its day, you can see how Teamo collects subs and match fees for your club.
Keeping the Treasurer's Records Clean
Whatever tool you use, a tidy set of accounts protects you and the club. Keep a single, current record of who has paid what; reconcile your bank or platform balance regularly rather than once a year in a panic; and make sure at least one other committee member can see the books. If your club is a registered charity or CASC, you also have a real opportunity to reclaim tax on eligible subscriptions and donations - our guide to Gift Aid for football clubs explains how that works and how much it can be worth. Clean records make Gift Aid claims, year-end reporting and any audit dramatically less painful.
Subs, Selection and Fairness Go Together
Money and fairness are linked more than treasurers sometimes realise. If a family has paid their subs, they reasonably expect their child to get a fair share of game time - and a "no pay, no play" prompt only feels right when selection itself is even-handed. It is worth setting your approach to minutes alongside your approach to subs so the two policies pull in the same direction; our guide to team selection and game time covers how to keep that balance fair across a squad.
Subs are, of course, just one slice of running a club. If you are setting up your money model for the first time, or reviewing it as you grow, the wider how to run a junior football team guide walks through the whole season - registration, affiliation, communication and the rest. And when the admin finally runs itself, you can put the evenings back into coaching: browse the full Football drills library for hundreds of practices sorted by skill and age group.
Frequently Asked Questions
How much are junior football subs?
Most grassroots junior clubs charge a one-off annual or termly sub plus a small weekly match or training fee. As a rough guide, annual subs commonly fall somewhere in the £80 to £200 range per child, and weekly subs around £3 to £5, though it varies hugely by region, by whether you hire a 3G pitch, and by how much the club fundraises. The honest way to set the figure is to add up your real costs for the season - pitch hire, referees, league and County FA affiliation, kit, balls, first aid and a winter venue - then divide by your expected number of players and weeks. Do not guess; cost it.
Should I charge weekly match fees or monthly subs?
Both models work, and many clubs run a mix: a larger annual or termly sub to cover fixed costs like affiliation and kit, plus a small weekly fee that scales with attendance. Weekly cash fees feel fair because players only pay when they turn up, but they create a relentless collection job - the classic £3 in an envelope every Saturday across several age groups. Monthly or termly subs by Direct Debit are far easier to administer and budget against, because the money arrives automatically whether or not you remember to ask. The best answer for most volunteer treasurers is to move the recurring part to Direct Debit and keep cash only for genuine one-offs.
How do I stop chasing parents for football subs?
The cure for chasing is automation plus visibility. Set the recurring subs up as a Direct Debit or scheduled card payment so they collect themselves, switch on automatic reminders so the app does the nagging instead of you, and make payment status visible at the point of selection so an unpaid balance surfaces when you pick the team rather than in an awkward sideline conversation. Clubs that put payment status on the team sheet collect the large majority of what they are owed without anyone having to send a personal chase. It turns subs from a weekly battle into something that quietly runs in the background.
Are there card fees on collecting club payments?
Yes - taking money digitally always carries a small processing fee, whichever platform you use, and it is normal to factor it into your sub. At the time of writing a typical card rate is around 2.5% plus 20p per transaction, while Direct Debit is usually cheaper for recurring subs at around 2% plus 20p. The fixed 20p per charge is the part that stings on lots of small weekly payments, which is why bundling subs, match fees and event costs into a single payment can save money. Always check current rates before you decide, and weigh the small fee against the hours of cash-handling and chasing it removes.
What should I do if a family cannot afford the subs?
No child should miss out on grassroots football because of money, and a good club plans for that openly. Build in concessions and a quiet hardship route from the start - sibling discounts so families with two or three players are not penalised, the option to pay in instalments rather than one lump sum, and a discretionary fund or fee waiver handled confidentially through one trusted committee member. Make it easy to ask and impossible to embarrass anyone. Many clubs cover the cost of waivers through fundraising or a modest surplus built into everyone else's sub.
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