ESFA Update academies: 19 March 2025
Published 19 March 2025
Applies to England
© Crown copyright 2025
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This publication is available at https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/esfa-update-19-march-2025/esfa-update-academies-19-march-2025
Information: Transfer of Education and Skills Funding Agency (ESFA) functions to the Department for Education (DfE)
ESFA will close on Monday 31 March 2025.
A letter from David Withey, Chief Executive and Accounting Officer of ESFA, to accounting officers has more information.
ESFA Update will be called DfE Update and will still be sent on a Wednesday. For help with DfE enquiries, complaints and general questions visit the customer help portal.
Information: National Insurance contributions grants
On Tuesday 18 March 2025, DfE announced the additional funding for schools and colleges to support them with the increases to employer National Insurance contributions (NICs) costs in financial year 2025 to 2026.
We have published information on the funding for NICs for:
- mainstream schools and schools with early years provision
- high needs settings, being delivered through the core schools budget grant for special schools and alternative provision
- post-16 provision
Information: Pupil premium funding rates for 2025 to 2026
DfE has confirmed schools’ pupil premium funding rates for the 2025 to 2026 financial year. The pupil premium funding rates are increasing by 2.39% compared with 2024 to 2025, in line with inflation forecasts. The new per pupil rates which will come into force on Tuesday 1 April 2025 can be found in pupil premium: overview.
We will publish the indicative allocations for 2025 to 2026 shortly.
You can raise any queries you may have using our customer help portal.
Information: Pupil premium allocations for 2024 to 2025 financial year – quarter 4 update
We have published the quarter 4 update for the pupil premium allocations for 2024 to 2025 financial year. Quarter 4 payments will be made to academies on 8 April 2025
As previously communicated, we have introduced a new approach to the way we provide pupil premium allocations to academy trusts.
We have uploaded a statement in Document exchange for each academy trust showing the unsuppressed pupil premium allocations for the academies in each trust. Statements can be viewed and downloaded from the ‘documents received from ESFA’ section when signing in to Document exchange with your academy trust UKPRN account details in DfE sign-in.
It is important that single academy trusts use the trust UKPRN to access DfE sign in. If you use your academy UKPRN, you will not be able to view your pupil premium statement.
If you have any questions, contact us via our customer help portal.
Information: 16 to 19 funding allocation statements for 2025 to 2026
Last week we started issuing 16 to 19 funding allocation statements. We aim to issue the majority of allocations by the end of April 2025. You will receive a notification once your allocation statement is available on Document exchange in the ‘documents received from ESFA’ section. We have included a breakdown of our calculation in your statement and published guidance to help you understand your statement.
We have changed the deadline for business cases for academic year 2025 to 2026 and we will now only accept cases submitted within 4 weeks of your allocation statement being issued. We will not be able to consider late cases. Whilst the thresholds remain the same for academic year 2025 to 2026, we now calculate them using your total programme funding amount.
Further information can be found in 16 to 19 funding allocations. This information also includes the changes for business cases from academic year 2026 to 2027.
If you have any queries, use the customer help centre.
Reminder: Framework certificates must be claimed by 31 March 2025
DfE will stop funding for apprenticeship framework completion and certification on Monday 31 March 2025. Apprentices on frameworks will not be able to receive a certificate after this date, including if they have been on a break in learning.
Providers must withdraw all learners (including those on a break in learning) by R11 return at the very latest - certificates must be claimed by 31 March 2025.
More information on prior communications can be found on completing and certifying apprenticeship frameworks and our ESFA Update in September 2024.
If you have any queries, contact us via the customer help portal.
Webinar: Academy finance professionals March power hour – Financial Benchmarking and Insights Tool
Thursday 20 March, 3pm to 4pm. Register online.
Webinar: Q&A drop-in sessions – academies chart of accounts and automation
Wednesday 26 March, 2pm to 2:30pm. Register online.
Webinar: Risk protection arrangement (RPA) members only – summer fetes
Wednesday 26 March 2025, 10am to midday. Register online.
Webinar: RPA members only – stress
Thursday 3 April 2025, 10:00am to midday. Register Online.