Rebecca Rhodes, Senior Associate, UVAC r.rhodes@bolton.ac.uk The 2017 to 2018 SUBCONTRACTING RULES Update (using version 2 of the 2017 to 2018 Funding Rules) Rebecca Rhodes, Senior Associate, UVAC r.rhodes@bolton.ac.uk

Agenda Subcontracting Subcontractors Subcontractor Management Current Issues / Scenarios

Documentation (with hyperlink = Para 121 onwards ) Provider Agreement Institution XYZ & SFA Contract for Services Institution XYZ & SFA

Subcontracting – your accountabilities If you fail to check, SFA will place restrictions on your future use of subcontractors RoATP Main owning the employer relationship Must conduct all or ‘some’ of the training Supporting Must not exceed £500,000 delivery each year* Must not deliver 100% of the apprenticeship Employer-Provider Can only train their own staff (or connected company/charity) Must evidence actual costs of delivery as main or subcontractor Not on RoATP Must not exceed £100,000 delivery each year* *The first ‘year’ is 1 May 2017 – 31 March 2018

First Time Subcontractors P 127. You must not agree to the use of delivery subcontractors with an employer if you do not have knowledge, skills and experience of contracting with, and managing, delivery subcontractors. It appears that you can still seek written permission from the SFA. Existing guidance is still posted

Subcontracting Rules Delivery subcontractors must meet one of the following criteria : Be on RoATP for main or supporting routes (capped at 500K) The apprentice’s employer (or connected company) or charity and on RoATP having applied through employer provider route Deliver less than 100k value of training and assessment quantum between May 2017 and March 2018 You can only subcontract from your own budget line You retain the relationship with the employer at all times You must have a legally binding subcontract contract with the subcontractor (see Para 141 for detail) The main provider must deliver ‘some’ of the apprenticeship delivery in each employers apprentice programme which must have ‘some substance and not be just a brief input at the start or a small proportion of the total apprentice numbers

Subcontracting Considerations - Your Checks You MUST ensure that a ‘supporting’ RoATP registered subcontractor does not have contracts that exceed £500 k in total or 100k if not on RoATP) your subcontracting will be restricted the subcontractor excluded permanently CHECK the list of Declared Subcontractors, for those on the supporting RoATP route Require subcontractor to declare other contracts to you in signing your agreement All of the following must be carried out and results available to SFA: Seek legal advice about the Public Contracting Regulations on recruitment Carry out Due Diligence checks ( see examples ) You have to have an external audit report to SFA specifications if your delivery subcontracts exceeds 100k in a financial year, to provide assurance about your arrangements to manage and control your deliver subcontractors. You must supply a certificate signed and authorised to the SFA. Make effective decisions: Who you subcontract with is evidence of your robust management processes Don’t contract if you believe the organisation is not suitable - even if this loses you the contract with the employer Have procedures ( in your due diligence) to ensure you don’t fund an extremist organisation

List of Declared Subcontractors Your Delivery Subcontractor Declaration form is required twice this year between 1 May 2017 and 31 March 2018. Dates will be published Even if you don’t subcontract you MUST make a nil return Late return or failure to submit = suspended payments

Subcontractor Fees and Payments Employers If you subcontract to an employer to deliver part of the apprenticeship , they must be on the employer-provider route of the RoATP They can only deliver to their employers/ connected company employees Can only charge the actual costs if delivery You must check all of these elements Your Fees You must set out your fees for monitoring and managing the subcontract in the employer agreement and the subcontractor contract You must set out what support you provide for these fees And specify how you will monitor quality

Monitoring You must carryout a regular and substantial programme of QA checks visits at short notice You must manage and monitor to ensure high quality delivery that meets the SFA funding rules . You must report any instances to us where your findings don’t match records You cannot transfer the employer relationship lead You are responsible for the quality of delivery by your subcontractors include whether the apprentices exist and are eligible observation of initial guidance, assessment and delivery of training and/or on-programme assessment

Managing Subcontractors In Practice Regular (monthly) reviews review of forecast volumes, ILR data returns, progress You must make sure these meetings and reviews take place Document actions, circulate and follow up Check paperwork matches ILR - conduct a sample file review check dates, values, eligibility, incl employer provider/ connected company Check that ILR returns are made on time, funding is claimed (and paid to subcontractors) on time Termly visits to observe delivery across the portfolio of delivery: Quality of guidance, teaching and learning Embedding of safeguarding and PREVENT This all applies to employer providers - you are still responsible and accountable

Scenarios Scenario Fundable ? 1 HEI intends to subcontract delivery to the employer for 6 months of a 12 month programme YES Delivering 50 % passes the ‘some’ test 2 HEI intends to subcontract out all of the delivery of an integrated degree apprenticeship but is the degree awarding body ? NO Main provider must retain the employer relationship Owning the quality process does not count as ‘some’ training or assessment 3 HE staff are used by the EPA as assessors for the HE’s own apprentices Training provider cannot carry out the end point assessment 4 The Main provider is subcontracting back to the employer’s training team who are a commercial function so charge this rate for their delivery NO delivery to an employer’s own staff must be at cost

LET US KNOW WHAT YOU WOULD FIND USEFUL Questions Please use the questions facility to add your feedback and comments about the webinar Any further scenarios? - please email me r.rhodes@uvac.ac.uk Other webinars are available in the UVAC future webinar programme: http://www.uvac.ac.uk/webinars-events/register-on-uvacs-2017-event-and-webinar-programme/: Topics include: The ILR and Data On programme assessment and review LET US KNOW WHAT YOU WOULD FIND USEFUL