Guidance

Guidance for completing the disapplications form

Updated 1 August 2024

Applies to England

1. Introduction

This guidance is for local authorities. It sets out how to complete the disapplication request form.

The Secretary of State requires a local authority to submit a disapplication request to the Education and Skills Funding Agency (ESFA) where its local approach to school funding would not ordinarily be allowable within the Schools and Early Years Finance Regulations and dedicated schools grant (DSG): conditions of grant.

Where such situations arise, this disapplication request service provides local authorities with a process for submitting an exceptional request to the Secretary of State to disregard aspects of the regulations and DSG conditions of grant.

2. When to complete your submission

Please refer to the schools operational guide 2024 to 2025, section 45: timetable, for further information on when to submit a disapplication. We expect local authorities to work to similar timeframes, as set out in this guidance.

3. Accessing the form

Access the local authority disapplication request form to complete your return.

All relevant subforms must be submitted for your return to be considered complete:

• for general disapplications, high needs and early years requests (with the exception of early years pass-through requests), you must submit 5 subforms

• for school block movement and early years pass-through requests you must submit 6 subforms

You may wish to make a note of your request progress to keep track of each submission and to avoid missing submitting a subform.

3.1 Before you start

Make sure you have:

• read this guidance

• a DfE Sign-in account

• an explanation of the reasons why you are requesting to disapply

• information about any transitional measures you plan to implement

• details of all options you have considered

• financial impact assessment information, including any modelling that has been carried out

• read the pre-16 schools funding schools operational guide: 2024 to 2025

• if appropriate to your request, you should have read the early years entitlements: local authority funding operational guide 2024 to 2025

• if appropriate to your request, you should have read the high needs funding: 2024 to 2025 operational guide

• reviewed annex 1 of the high needs funding: 2024 to 2025 operational guide (if your request relates to high needs)

• information related to the financial health of the authority and any affected schools using schools financial benchmarking service to help you

3.2 DfE Sign-in

Sign in to your DfE Sign-in account

Follow the steps below to access your DfE Sign-in account:

1. When prompted, enter your DfE Sign-in credentials (your account email address and password) for authentication.

2. Choose the local authority you are completing the form for - this is only required if your account is linked to several local authorities.

3. The next page will display the details we hold about the local authority you selected when you signed in. This will show the name, address and URN or UKPRN, as well as the name and email address of the person who logged into DfE Sign-in.

4. If these details are correct, select ‘continue’ to go to the next page.

5. If you believe these details are incorrect, please contact us using the Customer Help Portal and we will investigate. You can still proceed with your submission.

6. Complete the form as instructed.

Your account must be connected to the local authority you are completing the form for. You do not need to add any services in DfE Sign-in; it is used only for authentication.

If you do not have a DfE Sign-in account

You will need to create one by following the steps below:

1. Visit the DfE Sign-in page.

2. Select ‘create a DfE Sign-in account’.

3. Enter your name and email address (use a valid business email address that contains your name).

4. We will send you an email to verify your email address; copy the code from this email and paste it into the box on the verification page.

5. Create a memorable password that is at least 14 characters. You can use numbers, symbols and spaces.

6. Sign in using your new credentials, and request access to the local authority for which you would like to make a submission.

7. Your request will be sent to the approver(s) at the local authority for action.

You may have noticed the term ‘approver’ when creating your account. An approver is someone at your local authority responsible for controlling who has access to DfE Sign-in and the services within the system. It is usually a senior person, such as an administrator or a manager.

For security reasons, you will need one of your local authorities’ approvers authorisation before you can access the form.

Once your request to access a local authority has been approved, you can follow the steps outlined under already have a DfE account to complete the form.

3.3  If you need further assistance

If you are having problems using the DfE Sign-in service, use our DfE Sign-in help service. You will be able to request further assistance if required. When raising a support request, select ‘other.’

If you have problems accessing the form, please contact us via the Customer Help Portal.

4.  Completing the form

The form is divided into a number of subforms that make up the full disapplication request. All relevant subforms must be submitted for your return to be considered completed:

• for general disapplications, high needs and early years requests (with the exception of early years pass-through requests) you must submit 5 subforms

• for school block movement and early years pass-through requests, you must submit 6 subforms

When authenticated through DfE sign-in, you will find a ‘save and continue’ button on each page of the form. If you need to sign out of a form, or you leave it open for an extended period before submitting it, you can resume your submission when you sign back in.

You will also be advised what will happen next once you have submitted the form and you will receive an email confirmation of your submission with a link to download a PDF copy of your submission.

4.1  Your details

We will show you the information we hold about the local authority you selected when you logged into your DfE Sign-in.

4.2 Types of requests

You can make a disapplication request for 1 of the 5 types as below:

• general (schools and central school services)
• schools block movement
• high needs
• early years – pass-through only
• early years – all others (not related to pass-through)

You then need to complete all the relevant sections/subforms following selecting your request type from above.

4.3 Subform details

Once you have signed in to access the digital submission form and selected a request category type, the form will present you with the list of the subforms for completion. You will need to complete and submit these to make a full submission.

You will need to return to the ‘complete your submission’ page after each subform submission to access and complete all the remaining subforms, which will involve you logging back into the form and retracing your steps to get to this page.

All listed subforms must be individually completed and submitted for your disapplication submission to be considered complete:

• for general disapplication, high needs and early years requests (not early years pass-through requests) you must submit 5 forms

• for school block movement and early years pass-through requests, you must submit 6 subforms

The following are the standard set of subforms you will need to complete for all disapplication types:

• summary

• supporting information

• consultation information

• legal

• equality assessment

More detail on each subform content is provided below.

There are the following subforms that may also apply, depending on the type of your request:

• school block movement

• early years pass-through only

For each request type, you will be asked questions on the following topics:

Summary

To complete this section, you will need:

• the reasons why you are making this request

• information about any transitional measures that you might need to implement

• confirmation of how your request fits with the national funding formula

Supporting information

To complete this section, you will need:

• details of any options that have been considered

• financial impact assessment information including any modelling that has been carried out

• to have reviewed annex 1 of the high needs funding: 2024 to 2025 operational guide (if your request relates to high needs)

• information related to the financial health of the authority and any affected schools using the schools financial benchmarking service to help you

You also have the option to upload up to 5 additional documents in support of your disapplication request. When uploading an additional file, you must provide a brief description in the ‘explanation’ box for this supporting information, including the relevant page and/or paragraph numbers you are referring to.

Consultation information

To complete this section, you will need to provide:

• information to demonstrate how you have consulted with schools, the schools forum and any other interested parties about your disapplication request

• schools forum minutes detailing the consultation and any vote that took place

Legal

To complete this section, you will need to:

• confirm your assessment of legal challenge risk as a result of your request

• confirm any mitigation steps to reduce risk of legal challenge

• confirm any legal advice received

• upload a copy of any legal advice received

Equality assessment

To complete this section, you will need to:

• provide a summary of what impact your request will have on pupils, schools and the local authority in terms of equality of opportunity

• upload a copy of your completed equality impact assessment or analysis

• identify and confirm equalities impact on age, gender, orientation, race, disability, religion or belief, gender assignment, pregnancy and maternity, civil partnerships and intersectional discrimination

School block movement

To complete this section, you will need to:

• consult the DSG deficit management plan guidance 

• provide details of previous block movements 

• provide information about specific budget pressures 

• provide an assessment of why the costs are exceeding funding level 

• provide details of your strategic financial plan (DSG management plan) 

• provide details of the impact of the proposed transfer on school budgets

Early years pass-through only

To complete this section, you will need to:

• confirm related entitlement funding stream  

• confirm the early years disapplication type 

• confirm implication of disapplication on the funding rate for the entitlement stream your request refers to 

• calculate (using the downloadable calculator in the digital form) and confirm the lower pass-through rate 

• have reviewed early years entitlements: local authority funding operational guide 2023 to 2024. We expect local authorities to work to similar timeframes, as set out in this guidance

4.4 Declarations page

You must complete the declarations on each subform. You will not be able to submit your form without fully completing this section.

4.5 Submission summary

You will see a summary page where you can check all your answers before submitting a subform on behalf of your local authority. You can change your answers by using the ‘change’ link that appears next to each data entry.

You can save your submission by clicking ‘save summary as PDF’ before you submit. If you are unable to see your submission summary within the PDF, you can download it by following steps as below or via the link within confirmation email that you will receive after each form submission.

1. At the summary page, select ‘file’ and then ‘print’ option.

2. A new window will pop up. From the dropdown, select ‘save as PDF’.

3. Click the ‘save’ button.

4.6  Confirmation

The final page confirms your subform submission and shows a unique reference number. Each completed subform has its own unique reference number. Make a note of all reference numbers as we will not include this information in your confirmation email.

We will send an email to confirm we received your individual subform submission, with a link to a PDF copy of your submission to the email address linked to your DfE Sign-in account.

Once you have completed all the subforms for your disapplication request you will receive an acknowledgement email.

4.7  Amending your submission

You can make changes to the subforms and resubmit. To do this, you will need to sign back in and access the main digital form page, select the relevant subform you wish to review and resubmit it.

Please also refer to the schools operational guide: 2024 to 2025, section 45: timetable, for further information on when to submit a disapplication.

5. Enquiries

If you have read this guidance and have any questions about this digital disapplication submission process, please contact us via the Customer Help Portal.