Frequently asked questions
AGM minutes
You take part in the annual general meeting, Notuly writes the meeting report: the summary, the resolutions and the action points. In everyone's inbox within ten minutes.
Available on macOS, Windows, iOS and Android.
Used by people at these organisations.
Short answer
AGM minutes are the written record of an annual general meeting: who attended, what was resolved and the outcome of each vote. The resolutions are the heart of the document; they carry more weight later than anything else in it. Notuly captures the AGM with your phone on the table and puts the report with the resolutions in your inbox within ten minutes.
The basics
Companies, charities, clubs and owners' associations all hold general meetings, and the minutes follow the same pattern everywhere. Not a word-for-word account, but the formal record of what was decided.
The name varies per country: annual general meeting or AGM in most of the world, simply the annual meeting in the United States. The minutes work the same way everywhere.
Good minutes are not a transcript. Governance guidance is consistent on this: minutes summarise what was done, not what was said, with enough context to understand the decision. You can see what that looks like on paper at a meeting minutes example.
AGM, committee meeting or board meeting: Notuly recognises the conversation type and picks the form that fits. Empty sections simply drop out. On Team and above, your organisation builds its own templates, so the minutes look the same every year.
Book a demoWhere it goes wrong
Most problems with minutes are not about writing style. They are about what never made it onto paper in the first place.
Whoever takes the minutes usually also wants to speak, vote and answer questions. You can't do both well at once, so the notes cover half the meeting and memory has to fill in the rest.
The busiest agenda items get the thinnest notes.
"Agreed" in the notes, but what exactly, and by how many votes? When a member challenges a decision months later, everything turns on the exact wording and the count, and those are the details loose notes drop first.
The resolutions list is the part that has to be right.
The longer the gap, the more the minutes become a reconstruction. By the time the draft goes round, members remember the meeting differently, and the document that should settle arguments starts new ones.
A same-day record beats a month-old memory.
The cycle
The formal side
Once approved and signed, minutes are the formal account of the meeting: the document a new committee, an accountant, a bank or a court reaches for. The rules differ per country and per organisation type, but the pattern is the same everywhere: the governing document says whether an AGM must be held, and the minutes are how its decisions are proven afterwards.
The United Kingdom is the clearest example. Companies must keep minutes of general meetings for at least ten years; minutes signed by the chair are evidence of the proceedings; and members have the right to inspect them. Where a resolution passes on a show of hands, the chair's declared result, as recorded in the minutes, is conclusive evidence of that outcome without proof of the vote counts, unless a poll is demanded. Charities follow their governing document, with the regulator expecting minutes of decisions, voting and conflicts of interest. In practice, clubs and associations follow their own constitution.
Owners' and residents' associations are usually the most formal of the lot, because their decisions cost the members money. Their legal regimes are national: in the Netherlands, for example, the VvE has its own statutory rules, which the Dutch version of this page covers.
General information, not legal advice; sources checked 10 August 2026. UK sources: Companies Act 2006, sections 355 to 358 and section 320; Charity Commission, Charities and meetings (CC48); and the Chartered Governance Institute's minute-taking guidance.
Recording and the GDPR
Generally yes, with openness; the exact recording rules differ per country. A recording of identifiable members is personal data under the GDPR, so you tell the meeting at the start that it is being recorded, why (to draft the minutes) and what happens to the recording afterwards. One sentence from the chair covers all three.
Governance guidance adds a sensible housekeeping rule: a recording made to draft the minutes is an aid, not a second record, so delete it once the minutes are approved. That is precisely how Notuly behaves by design: the audio is deleted within a minute of processing, and what remains is the report you work from. The minutes keep the decisions; personal data is not kept longer than needed.
Read can you record a meeting? for the rules per country, from the UK to the US and Germany.
With Notuly
This is how an AGM goes with Notuly. The chair opens the meeting and says the meeting is being recorded for the minutes. The phone lies on the table; for a hybrid meeting the desktop app for macOS and Windows records the room and the members online in one go. Notuly separates the speakers, up to 32 in a single conversation.
Within ten minutes of the meeting closing, the report is in your inbox: the summary, the resolutions as they were announced, and the action points with a name and a deadline ("Sam requests the roof quotes by Friday"). Want the verbatim text as well? If you choose, the transcript comes along as a .txt attachment.
You stay the secretary. You check the names and the resolutions, put the report in your organisation's template if you have one, and table it for approval as usual. The writing is what disappears, not your judgement.
What you gain
The draft exists the same day, while everyone still remembers the meeting the same way. No reconstruction weeks later.
The draft goes round while memories still match.
The wording and the announced result come from the recording, not from a scribbled "agreed". Exactly the details challenges turn on.
The resolutions list is right the first time.
Whoever takes the minutes this year, the report has the same shape: summary, resolutions, action points. Continuity survives a change of secretary.
Your successor can pick up the file and understand it.
How it works
Phone on the table, or the desktop app on for a hybrid meeting. The chair says the meeting is recorded for the minutes, and the agenda starts.
Chair, debate, vote, decide. Notuly listens and recognises who's speaking: up to 32 speakers, in the room and online.
End the recording. Within ten minutes the report is there: the summary, the resolutions and the action points. You check it, shape it into the formal minutes and circulate the draft.
On all your devices
Meeting on Teams, Zoom or Google Meet? The desktop app takes the notes straight from your laptop. And the iPhone and Android apps capture every conversation on the go.
Fourteen days free
Starter & Pro: prices incl. VAT · Team & Enterprise: prices excl. VAT
The audio is deleted within a minute of processing. Once your report has been sent, we no longer hold your data. What we don't keep can't leak.
We work in line with:
ISO 27001.
We work in line with ISO standards. Our data servers run in an ISO 27001-certified data centre in Amsterdam.
AGM minutes are the written record of an annual general meeting: who attended, what was discussed, what was resolved and the outcome of each vote. The resolutions are the heart of the document; once the minutes are approved and signed, they are the formal account of the meeting.
The organisation's name, the date and venue, who attended and who sent apologies, whether the meeting was quorate, approval of the previous minutes, each resolution with its exact wording and the result of the vote, any elections, and the action points. Not a word-for-word account: minutes record what was decided.
Common practice is that the next meeting approves the draft minutes and the chair then signs them. In the UK, signed minutes of a company general meeting are evidence of the proceedings under the Companies Act 2006.
In the UK, companies must keep minutes of general meetings for at least ten years. Charities, clubs and associations follow their governing document and national rules; good practice is to keep approved minutes for the life of the organisation. Personal data in them should not be kept longer than needed.
No. Minutes summarise what was decided, with enough context to understand why; a transcript records every word. Governance guidance is explicit that minutes should not be verbatim. With Notuly you get the report with the decisions, and, if you choose, the transcript as a .txt attachment.
Generally yes, provided you are open about it: recording rules differ per country, so check yours. Tell attendees at the start that the meeting is recorded to draft the minutes, and what happens to the recording; a recording of identifiable people is personal data under the GDPR. Governance guidance recommends deleting the recording once the minutes are approved; with Notuly the audio is already deleted within a minute of processing.
No. In the UK, an AGM is required for public and traded companies; private companies only hold one if their articles say so. Charities, clubs and owners' associations follow their governing document and national rules. Whether the meeting is required or not, the minutes work the same way.
Yes. The general meeting of an owners' or residents' association follows the same pattern: agenda, quorum, resolutions with the vote, action points. The legal regime differs per country; in the Netherlands, for example, the VvE has its own rules, which the Dutch version of this page covers.
Yes. Notuly recognises up to 32 speakers in a single conversation and works for in-person, hybrid and online meetings. One recording covers the room and the members who join online.
It replaces the writing, not the secretary. Within ten minutes of the meeting you have the report with the summary, the resolutions and the action points. You check the names and the resolutions, put it in your own template if you have one, and table it for approval as usual.
You start free: three conversations per month, no payment details needed, which covers the meeting schedule of many committees. Paid plans are per licence; the current prices are further up this page.
Processing runs on our own servers in Amsterdam and the data never leaves the EU. The audio is deleted within a minute of processing, your conversations are never used to train AI, and there is no archive: what remains is the report in your inbox. A data processing agreement (GDPR Article 28) is available on Team and above.
Let Notuly capture your next general meeting and see what lands in your inbox afterwards. Three conversations free, no payment details needed.