Update 2026-01-09: I've updated the screenshots and links for the latest version of OpenRefine. This update uses a much simpler way of adding additional data in columns.
Part II - add charity details
Once you've got a list of organisations in OpenRefine with organisation identifiers you can then add more details about the organisations using findthatcharity.uk. You can add:
- website
- latest income
- link to Charity Commission register
- date registered/removed
- Company Number
1: Add columns from reconciled column
The Reconciliation API that powers the charity lookup also allows you to fill in additional details about those organisations.
To fetch the data, click the arrow menu next to your reconciled column and select
Edit Column > Add columns from reconciled values....
In the resulting dialog you need to select which columns you would like to add. Start typing to find the columns you're looking for. In this case we're adding the website address and the date the organisation was registered.
Click ok to add the new columns. This may take a while depending on how many rows you have.
2. Save the data
While OpenRefine is useful for this kind of data cleaning and linking, you'll want to
export the data to another programme to perform analysis. You can do this using the
Export menu found in the top right hand corner. The default formats are pretty
straightforward, and it's possible to create more sophisticated exports (including a JSON
export) using the Custom tabular exporter... option.
One thing to remember with export - it will use any active filters when exporting, so make sure you don't have restrictive filters that exclude data you actually need.
