Introduction
Consistent financial reporting introduction for 2020 to 2021
The consistent financial reporting framework (CFR) provides a standard template for schools to collect information about their income and expenditure in the financial year 2020 to 2021. The information collected is used to support benchmarking and enables comparative reports to be produced for governors and local authorities.
The CFR framework applies to maintained schools and pupil referral units. It is optional for nurseries and non-maintained special schools.
Governing bodies of maintained schools must provide the local authorities with a financial statement, presented in accordance with the approved headings and sub-headings set out in the Consistent Financial Reporting (England) Regulations 2012 and in compliance with the established accounting practices of the local authority.
This includes:
- all allocations and other income received in a financial year including any balances brought forward from the previous financial year
- all expenditure within that financial year
- a summary of the school’s financial position at the end of that financial year
The guidance is aimed at:
- local authority finance officers
- school finance officers
- business managers
- bursars
The Department for Education uses COLLECT (Collections On-Line for Learning, Education, Children and Teachers) to capture CFR data from schools and local authorities. Further information about the CFR framework and data collection is available online.
We’ve included guidance for some data items below:
| Data item | Guidance |
|---|---|
| Federated flag | Federated submission: Please enter either no: school is not a federated school, or yes: school is federated and returning finance data on behalf of other schools in the federation. LAEstab numbers of schools in federation. Please enter the LAestab numbers of schools in the federation for whom you are returning finance data. |
| Data version | This will be an automatic response from the schools MIS system. If there are any red errors on the CFR return preliminary will be attached to it, if there are no red errors then final will be attached. |
| Complete: Is this data for a full financial year? | Y = full year, N = partial year i.e. school opened or closed. |
| Cash or Accruals accounting | You must enter either Cash or Accruals. |
| Rates exempt | If your school is rates exempt, then please enter Y, otherwise N. |
| Insurance | If your schools insurance policies/premiums have been purchased centrally, at no cost to the school, then please enter Y, otherwise N. |
Risk protection arrangement (RPA)
There has been text changes made to I11, E23 and E30 to reflect the risk protection arrangements (RPA) on pages 11, 26 and 30.
Coronavirus (COVID-19)
We have made amendments to I18 to collect information on grants provided specifically in connection with COVID-19.
The School and Early Years Finance Regulations (England) allow for a local authority to allocate a single budget share to a governing body where there are two or more schools federated under section 24 of the Education Act 2002.
Federated schools receiving a single budget share should report collectively in their CFR return. Each school will retain their own establishment number and so it is for the schools and local authority to agree which establishment number the federation will report against. When submitting CFR returns for these schools, the school returning financial data should complete the section, LAEstab numbers of schools in federation, and enter the LAestab numbers of schools in the federation for whom they are returning finance data.
Federated schools receiving separate budget shares should report separately in their CFR return.
There are instances where schools hold money on behalf of other schools as part of a hub or network to carry out projects. This can result in under/over reporting of expenditure items in the CFR return for individual schools within the hub/network. Local authorities should pro-rate the funding between the individual schools within the hub/network, in order to avoid this discrepancy in the CFR returns.
If the situation still arises, the local authority should net off the income and expenditure for schools in this position before they submit the CFR returns to the Department, ensuring that correct income, expenditure and balances are reported for each school. Please include in the notes section of the CFR returns information about the netting off, which schools this has affected and how.