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SCHOOL FINANCE page

Contact email address for the School Finance team is: schoolfinanceteam@walsall.gov.uk

 

Useful Links / Websites:

www.education.gov.uk

 

Payroll Sept 2024 – issue with pension coding

There has been an issue with the coding of pension contributions for the September 2024 payroll. The pension costs have been coded to subjective 17000 (basic pay) instead of 17008 or 17009.

Please note, the payroll system/payroll reports are correct, it is only the general ledger transactions/costing that are incorrect.

A journal will be posted in the month of October 2024 to correct this and will be done for all effected schools, so there is no requirement for schools to do this individually.

Please email SchoolFinanceTeam@walsall.gov.uk if you have further queries regarding this.

Consistent financial reporting framework 2024 to 2025 ICT E20 A-G

In view of the revised CFR E20 coding requirements and subsequent implementation in the Summer Term, please find a list of codes and examples of descriptions which have been reviewed to reflect in more detail the new framework from 1st April 2024.

Code E20 A- G Example
E20A X2 63601 - Connectivity Main and backup broadband lines, wireless networks, network switches, network cables
  telephony, ISDN, ASDL or other dedicated phone lines
   
E20B X2 63801 - Onsite Servers Purchased or leased onsite physical servers present in the school where these are not capitalised
  onsite servers that support cloud-based storage
   
E20C X2 60500 - ICT Learning resources Curriculum software to support teaching and learning such as apps and lesson planning tools
(Curriculum) subscriptions and licences associated with educational software and websites
  digital learning platforms
  e.g. Twinkle/White Rose/My Maths/ Bug club
   
E20D X2 64500 - Subscriptions – Admin Administration and management software such as management information systems (MIS), safeguarding, finance, cashless catering, building management and payment portals
  e.g. Juniper/Arbor subs/ Parent Pay/Cpoms
E20D X2 60010 - Licences for Admin Equipment e.g. LA ICT Anti Virus Licenses/Microsoft
   
E20E X2 60000 - Purchase Equipment Laptops, desktops and tablets purchased or leased by the school used for teaching, learning and administration
E20E X2 85951 - RCCO ICT (Capital purchases)  
   
E20F X2 60009 -  Other Hardware.   Small items of hardware eg mouse not included in a bundle / Printers /Projector/display screens/CCTV
E20F X2 60031 - Leasing Charges Schools  / Hire & Rental of Equipment  
   
E20G X2 63802 - IT Support / Consultancy IT Support for Arbor / SIMS/LA ict etc

Please ensure that any miscoded transactions already processed are amended via a journal.

 

Information: Post-16 schools budget grant

The post-16 schools budget grant will help schools and academies with their overall costs in the 2024 to 2025 financial year, following confirmation of the 2024 teacher pay award.

Post-16 schools budget grant - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)

Information: Early years budget grant allocations for September 2024 to March 2025

Guidance for local authorities and early years providers on the early years budget grant (EYBG) for September 2024 to March 2025

Early years budget grant (EYBG) 2024 to 2025 - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)

Information: Core schools budget grant (CSBG) 2024 to 2025

Guidance for schools and local authorities on the core school budget grant (CSBG) methodology and rates for September 2024 to March 2025

Core schools budget grant (CSBG) 2024 to 2025 - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)


£1000 cash incentive for new or returning early years workers in Walsall

https://go.walsall.gov.uk/newsroom/ps1000-cash-incentive-new-or-returning-early-years-workers-walsall           


LMST bank balances 2023/24 – misstated

Year-end entries for LMST bank balances are posted to the following codes:

97049 – bank balance at March 2023,

60517 – movement between March 2023 balance and March 2024 balance.

The movement entries on code 60517 have been misstated in the accounts and will therefore need to be corrected.

Schools can check the entries by reconciling to the balance on their March 2024 LMST bank statement.

With regards to 2023/24 final CFR reports, a revised report will be sent to schools via email by Friday 17th May 2024.

I can only apologise for this error and any inconvenience it may have caused.  

 

Nursery Schools Early Years Budget notification 2024-25 financial year

The revised Early Years budget notifications, based on the Jan-24 census data can be found on the link below

Early Years Budget Statements - Nursery Schools 2024-25 revised

 

Primary Schools Early Years Budget notification 2024-25 financial year

The revised Early Years budget notifications, based on the Jan-24 census data can be found on the link below

Early Years Budget Statements - Primary Schools 2024-25 revised
 

 

High Needs Place Funding

High Needs Place Funding for Specials, ARP’s, SRP’s and PRU’s will be paid in two instalments in financial year 2024/25. This replaces the termly instalments paid in previous years.

The payments will be as follows,

Payment 1 – April to August (5/12ths)

Payment 2 – September to March (7/12ths)

If you have any queries, please contact Nuala Stockton (nuala.stockton@walsall.gov.uk)
 

Schools Three Year Budget Plan Template 2024 - 2027

Please find the Three Year Budget template below, the deadline for submission is 1st June 2024 to schoolfinanceteam@walsall.gov.uk 

Schools Three Year Budget Template 2024 - 2027

 

Rates Bills 2024-25 - note to all Maintained Primary Schools

Where schools have received a Rates bill for 2024-25 financial year, these bills are for record purposes to confirm what has been paid via ESFA/Business Rates Portal - No payment by individual schools are required.

 

Surplus revenue balances above 8% Balance Control Mechanism due to energy credits          (uploaded 22/03/2024)

Due to the late notification and processing of credits for duplicated payment of energy bills that has affected some schools, if the energy credit value causes the revenue surplus balance, after year-end adjustments and prior year commitments, to exceed the 8% balance control mechanism (BCM) as set out in the Walsall Scheme for Financing Schools document, an exception to the rule will be applied. This exception applies to the energy credit only as shown in the example below,

Example:

Final revenue balance before energy credit

£180,000

Total revenue income

£2,500,000

Revenue balance as % of income

7%

 

 

Final revenue balance after energy credit

£230,000

Revenue balance as % of income

9%

 

 

Energy credit

£50,000

Maximum revenue balance at 8% (BCM)

£200,000

Final balance exceeds BCM by

£30,000

 

 

No action is required in this example as it is evident that the reason the final balance exceeds the 8% BCM is due to the £50k energy credit.

 

The LA will identify schools with higher balances as routine during the closedown period and will automatically adjust the BCM rule for any school that has received late energy credits. There is no requirement for schools apply for this.

We are not expecting this to affect many schools as the payment duplication error should have been identified during the financial year and accounted for within revised outturn forecasts. If you have any questions regarding this or the BCM in general, please contact Louise Meredith (louise.meredith@walsall.gov.uk)

 

 

Schools Early Years Budget notification 2024-25 financial year

uploaded 15/03/2024 

The Early years budget share notification statements for Primary and Nursery schools can be found be clicking on the links below

Early Years Budget Statements - Primary 2024-25

 

Schools Budget Statements 2024-25

uplaoded 28/02/2024 

Schools budget statements for the 2024-2025 financial year can be found by clicking on the links below

Budget  Statements Primary Schools 2024-25

Budget Statements Secondary Schools2024-25

 

Request for details of New Leases

uploaded 13/3/24 As in September 2023 and December 2023 we are sending you a request to provide us with details of any new leases your school has entered into.  This is for the period 01 January 2024 to 31 March 2024.

This is to ensure that the council is able to comply with new requirements for accounting for leases.  As previously explained we are sending you this request three times a year as based on the following timings:

  • August/September for the period 1 April to 31 August

  • December for period 1 September to 31 December,

  • March for the period 1 January to 31 March each year.

The new requirements require the council (including schools) to review any contract it enters into and determine whether there is a lease arrangement within the contract.  This covers a wide range of agreements and contracts including:  Leases, contract hire, rental agreements, hire purchase agreements and any other contracts with a right to use assets.

To enable the council to capture the relevant information the attached template should be completed fully for each lease.  The information contained on this template is that which is required under the new requirements to enable the leases to be accounted for correctly.

These requirements should not be unusual to any lease provider as they are now required by private sector businesses to ensure they can account for leases correctly.  This is due to the new method accounting for leases being adopted by councils was adopted a few years ago within the private sector.

To assist in completing the template I have also attached three additional documents to assist.  There are two documents that should assist you in determining whether a contract you have entered into contains a lease.  The third document provides assistance in completing the template.

Can you please review any contracts entered into since 01 January 2024 up to 31 March 2024 and completed the attached template as required.  Please then return the templates to Robert Page (robert.page@walsall.gov.uk) by 21 March 2024.

I appreciate this is a tight timescale but this information is required for the council's final accounts process.

Letter to Schools Requesting Lease Information March 2024

Lease decision Flowchart 1

IFRS16 Individual Lease Data Template Instructions 

Guidance note for IFRS16 Information Gathering Template

Appendix 1 Information Gathering Template Form version

 

Schools Year End Closedown 2023-24 

uploaded 07/02/2024

The guidance for the Schools Year End closedown 2023-24 process and the relevant forms for completing can be found by clicking on the links below.   Please note on completion of Debtors accruals DO NOT include debts owed from within Walsall Council i.e. Grants/High Needs/Early Years etc. or debts from within a Walsall maintained school where an invoice has been raised on the External Debtors form (appendix 5),  these debtors are classed as Internal detors and should be included on the Internal Debtors form (appendix 5A)

ENERGY:- where a school has directly processed a Total Energies gas bill and a re-charge has also occurred via WMBC for the same bill, thus resulting in a duplicated payment, if these credits do not appear on your schools March 2024 reports please enter these details on the Creditors Provision Credit notes appendix 1a as a year-end accrual.

SCHOOLS CLOSEDOWN APPENDICES - 2023-24_amended

Close Down - Year End Financial guidance for Schools 2023-2024

 

Capital Statement year end return 2023-24

uploaded 15/02/2024

As part of year end closedown processes all maintained and voluntary controlled schools are required to provide a statement detailing all spending on capital items, together with copy invoices evidencing the spend. The complete Schools Capital Statement is required by Thursday 14 March 2024, this statement is to be returned electronically as an excel document to Robert Page – robert.page@walsall.gov.uk and Natalia Cebotari natalia.cebotari@walsall.gov.uk.

Year End Reporting of Capital spending from revenue budgets

Letter to Schools requesting capital statement 2023-24 financial year 

Examples of Capital expendiutre

Schools Capital Statement Year End Return 2023-24

 

Extended Schools 2023-24 Cash Book

uploaded 15/02/2024

For schools who operate Extended Schools, the 2023-24 financial year Cash book template for completion can be found by clicking on the link below, the completed Cash book together with a PDF copy of the bank statement clearly showing the balance in hand at 31st March 2024 must be submitted to the school finance email address schoolfinanceteam@walsall.gov.uk no later than Friday 17th May 2024.

Cashbook Template - Extended Schools Bank Account 2023-2024

 

Properly Assigned Sums (PAS 2023-2024)

uploaded 31/01/2024 

Please read the PAS Submission Guidance notes before completing the forms. 

PAS Submission Guidance 2023-2024

Completed forms must be returned by the following dates:

  • Form A by Friday 23rd February 2024

  • Form B by Friday 22nd March 2024

PAS Form A 

PAS Form B

 

 

Request for details of New Leases 

uploaded 06/12/2023 - Can you please review any contracts entered into since 01 September 2023 up to 31 December 2023 and completed the attached template as required. Please then return the templates to Robert Page (robert.page@walsall.gov.uk) by 26 January 2024.

Any questions or issues when completing please direct these to Robert Page 01922 650317.

Please see relevant documents below:-

Lease Information - Letter to schools

Lease Information - IFRS16 Individual lease data template instructions

Lease Information -Guidance note for IFRS16 information gathering template

Lease Information - Appendix 1 information gathering template form.xlsx

 

HN Top Up changes to termly weeks

uploaded 24/11/2023 - Please note that the number of weeks for HN Top Up funding in Autumn term 23/24 is 17 weeks and Spring term 23/24 is 13 weeks. 

Early Years HN Top Up funding in Autumn term 23/24 is 15 weeks  and Spring term 23/24 is 10 weeks. 

Please note this differs from the information on the current CFR.

Please direct any queries to nuala.stockton@walsall.gov.uk

 

Treasury - Cash Income - Schools

To help speed up the process of allocating miscellaneous income to schools, could schools please email cashIncome@walsall.gov.uk if you are aware of any funding that is due to be paid into the Councils main bank account and include the following information,  

  • Payer name

  • Amount

  • Payment date

  • Oracle code to be credited

Cheques and how we can avoid fraudulent activity

uploaded 05/10/2023 

Recently it has been noted that a couple of cheques presented at the bank have been amended, one such cheque was stopped but the other one was processed fraudulently at a cost of over £3,000.00. 

Please consider ways of reducing the number of cheques issued by your school or service area as it is a high fraud risk area, is it possible to use a purchase card or get the supplier set-up. If cheques are needed, please follow the advice given below:

  • Write cheques in serial number order and make sure all cheques are still in the book, with none removed from the middle or back.

  • Write or print starting from the very left and use reasonably large text, leaving no spaces. Draw a line through unused areas and do not leave large spaces between words.

  • When you are writing a cheque to a large organisation, such as HM Revenue and Customs, never simply make the cheque payable to that organisation. Always add further details on the payee line, for example ‘HM Revenue and Customs re JJ Jones Acc Ref 1234567’.

  • Be careful with the figure box. Never put a space between the ‘£’ sign and the amount you are paying. Always draw a line through any spaces you do not use after the numbers.

  • If you send a cheque by post, avoid using envelopes that reveal their contents and send high-value cheques via secure mail.

  • Keep photocopies of cheques for referral queries.

  • When cheque referrals are received from Barclays, if you are not around to review and approve the cheque these will go as unpaid. We are given a very tight turnaround time to get cheques released.

  • If cheques issued are not banked promptly place a follow-up phone call to ensure they have been received.

  • Keep the cheque book securely locked away when not in use.

  • If you need to place a stop on a cheque please contact Aran Mangat, Anna Bignell or Daniel McParland. If you have any queries please get in touch.

Aran Mangat - Aran.Mangat@walsall.gov.uk 01922 650576

Anna Bignell – Anna.Bignell@walsall.gov.uk 01922 652352

Daniel McParland – Daniel.McParland@walsall.gov.uk 01922 652391

 

New Guidance - E27 Payments to an agency 

From 1st April 2023 E27 has been updated to include all non teaching costs paid to an agency who have been brought in to cover absence - no longer use E03 agency.

A new subjective has been mapped to E27, 34305, this should be used with your main cost centre cc ending with “00” and the relevant additional field. 

Any transactions processed for Non Teaching Agency costs since 1st April 2023 will need to be journalled to E27.

 

Past Pension Costs - Update

I refer to the message regarding changes to the employer contribution rate for LGPS from 2023/24, and the removal of the separate recharge for past pension costs on CFR code E08.

Following a recent update received by the Local Authority on the allocation of LGPS, I write to advise that whilst the total LGPS charge will be 25.6%, there will be a split payment on the pensionable pay and from 1st April 2023:

  • An amount of 21.7% will be processed via the payroll which is for current service costs

  • The balance of 3.9% for past service costs will be recharged via manual journal to the appropriate payroll salary code. These payments will be identified within the Monthly Monitoring Report Transaction listing.

As previously outlined, the authority are following the pension funds approach for allocating LGPS costs for 2023/24, and the total LGPS charge of 25.6% of LGPS pensionable pay remains the estimate for the year.

If you have any queries please contact  - Kelly-Anne.Abley@walsall.gov.uk

 

Additional Annual Leave Day

From 1st April 2023, all employees on National Joint Council (NJC) terms and conditions will receive a permanent increase of one day (pro rata for part-time) to their annual leave entitlement.  For term time only employees the extra days leave will be reflected in their individual term time calculation.  Only all year workers will be entitled to take the day as part of their annual leave entitlement. Please contact Shabnam.Nasim@walsall.gov.uk if you have any queries ref T/T Fractions

 

Early Years budget statements 2023-24 

Please be advised that the indicative budgets for 2023/24 are based on January 2022 data as finance did not have the January 2023 census at the time the budgets needed to be published. Your schools actual payments will, however, be based on January 2023 Census as validated data will be available by the time the payments are actually made.

Early Years Budget Statements Nursery Schools 2023-24

Early Years Budget Statements Primary Schools 2023-24

 

Schools 2023-24 Budget statements

Your schools budget statement for 2023-24 can be found by clicking on the link below

Budget Statements Primary Schools 2023-24

Budget Statements Secondary Schools 2023-24

 

Local Government Pension Scheme (LGPS) Charges 2023/24

The changes to Local Government Pension Scheme charges for 2023/24 can be found by clicking on the link here Local Government Pension Scheme

 

National Non-Domestic Rates (NNDR) 2023/24 – change to the payment process

Rates bills for financial year 2023/24 will be paid centrally by the billing authority. This means that the LA, as the billing authority, will upload the data onto the DfE portal and payment will be made by the DfE, rather than individual schools. Billing authorities will continue to issue bills to schools for information only and for local accounting purposes.

Primary and secondary schools – this will show as a deduction on your budget notification statement as this element of your funding will be retained. This change does not apply to maintained nursery schools.

 

New additional grant for mainstream schools 2023/24

We have recently been notified of a new grant for mainstream schools in 2023/24, please use the link below to read the methodology and guidance and to access a calculator which will provide an indicative allocation.

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/mainstream-schools-additional-grant-2023-to-2024

Final allocations will be published later in the spring 2023 term.

There will be equivalent additional funding for special schools and PRU’s that will come via the High Needs Block this will be in addition to place and top-up funding. Allocations for 2023/24 to be communicated to schools later in the spring term 2023.

 

West Midlands Pension Fund – triannual revaluation – 2023/24 to 2025/26

for further details please click on the link to download the document 

West Midlands Pension Fund triannual revaluation 2023_24 to 2025

 

Guidance for Schools Expenditure

In light of a recent request for guidance around what expenditure is considered appropriate to be funded from school budgets as detailed in the Walsall Scheme for Financing Schools please refer to the document - Guidance for Schools Expenditure

 

Top Up Rates 2023-24 - High Needs Top-up Rates 2023-24

Exclusion Rates 2023-24 - Exclusion Rates 2023-24

 

DFC - Capital spending

DFC allocations are devolved to schools to manage alongside delegated budget shares, Schools are required to notify the Local Authority of all proposed Capital spend and seek consent where the project is in respect of building works.

  • Queries regarding your schools DFC allocation/balance - contact Pranav Bawa pranav.bawa@walsall.gov.uk

  • for advice if the project is legible expenditure within DFC Guidelines - contact Shelley Oakden shelley.oakden@walsall.gov.uk

To download documents click on the links below:-

Capital Expenditure - Schools Guidance

Notification Proposed Capital Expenditure - Apx1 Section 1

Notification Proposed Capital Expenditure - Apx1 Section 2

Examples of Capital Expenditure

DFC Schools Unique cost centre codes

 

LMST and Petty Cash reimbursements

Email your completed claim forms to PaymentsTeam@walsall.gov.uk failure to email to the correct email address will result in delay in processing. If you have any questions please contact the Payments Team on the email above.

 

Information on Tax Free Childcare

For the Tax - Free Chidcare, UK-wide scheme to help working parents pay for childcare the UTR parents will need to quote is:   9717719117

For Local Autority schools only, the Post code is WS1 1TW

 

HMRC VAT Guidance

Please note a review of HMRC Guidance for Local Authorities and Voluntary Aided Schools has been completed and the agreed findings have been placed in the public domain and can be found on CIPFA website.  Please contact Robert Page robert.page@walsall.gov.uk with any queries in regard to the guidance.