16-19 Planned Hours Reduction

To add to your question Chris - I would be interested to know in addition what providers do for EEP study that is not due to happen yet. 

Using your example if your Voc learner attended 62 days which lets say that is November 2025.

If that whole group was due to go out on work experience in January 2026 - would you be removing the hours or leaving these EEP hours?

If they're a full withdrawal you don't need to change the hours at all, we only change hours when they withdraw from part of their programme and they haven't hit 42 days on it.

If a student starts qual A in week one, starts qual B in week 5, then quits qual B in week 7, you're saying we can keep all the hours for qual B even though they only did two weeks, just because another part of their programme went over 42 days? Yet if qual B went from week 1 to week 5 (double the length of delivery compared of my first scenario), you can't keep the hours (other than what was delivered). I think the issue is that the guidance assumes that all aims start in the same week, which they don't always. 

Q1 If a student is studying 4 AS level learning aims over one year starting in September and withdraws from one (or more) of them after 5 weeks, may funding be recorded all year for the withdrawn learning aims?

A1 No. If the student withdraws from any learning aims before they meet the qualifying period of the study programme, the institution must exclude the hours for the withdrawn qualification from the total hours for the year. In reviewing the planned hours, the institution may include planned hours for other activity that is planned to displace the hours lost by the student withdrawal from the initial AS level.

If the learner transfers from a qualification before the qualifying start period, then the timetabled hours up to the point of transfer may be included in this field if they would make a significant material difference to the learner’s total planned hours such that they would move from one funding band to another.

Ryan's question does demonstrate this well. We absolutely do keep Work Experience hours for intended placement that never happened because they withdrew after 42 days but before a placement could be completed (assuming most of the cohort did a placement so we prove it was a realistic prospect).

All the aim start dates are within 3 days of each other. This is what's thrown me.

129: When a student withdraws from one or more aims within the first 6 weeks of a programme, institutions must remove all of the planned hours for the aim from the total planned hours, unless excluding the hours already delivered within the first 6 weeks would make a material difference to the student’s funding band. In those cases, institutions can include the hours already delivered in the planned hours.

PDSATs 26Y-209 identifies the completions, withdrawals or transfers within first 6 weeks (that is planned to take between 2 and 24 weeks and that consists of fewer than 485 planned) and these are reduced to the actual delivered hours. But what about the full time plans?

Thanks 

Steve Hewitt

Hi Steve, please could you clarify this point for me?

If a learner fully withdraws from their study programme, and only the core aim has met the qualifying period (with English and maths not meeting the qualifying period), should we retain all planned hours for all aims?

Our understanding is:

• If a learner fully withdraws before the qualifying period, we remove the hours for the whole programme.

• If a learner withdraws from one aim before the qualifying period but continues on the rest of the programme, we remove the hours for the withdrawn aim only.

We are just unsure how to treat a full withdrawal where only one element of the programme has met the qualifying period.

Many thanks,
Emily

I sent the query to the service desk and they have just pointed me in the direction of the provider support manual;

Good morning Chris

Planned hours should remain unchanged, as they reflect what was agreed at the start. Please refer to the appropriate guidance for the situation. I’ve added a link below that may assist, though feel free to use any guidance you consider more suitable.

Recording learner absence or withdrawal

You must determine the intent of learners who are absent from learning, whether the learner expects to return to learning, and the reason for the absence. You are expected to have robust absence monitoring and an absence and withdrawal policy, which you implement to ensure that the progress of all learners is monitored.

A learner must be considered to have withdrawn from a programme of learning when they have:

• Made known a decision to withdraw from the learning,

• Exceeded the training provider’s absence and withdrawal policy, or

• Been removed from learning by their training provider.

When a learner withdraws, the programme aim (where applicable) and any learning aims should be closed.

Recording a withdrawn learner who has no intention to return.

• Completion status field must be code 3.

• Learning actual end date is the date of last learning activity for the aim.

• Use a relevant code for the Withdrawal reason field.

• Outcome must be code 3.

• Outcome grade data is not returned.

You must include learners in the ILR who have attended one episode of learning. If a learner withdraws within the funding qualifying period, the learner must still be included in the ILR.

If a learner withdraws without completing one episode of learning, for example without attending the first class, then they must not be included in the ILR.

Yeah, what Chris said!

Basically, if you remove hours for fully withdrawn learners you're stuffing yourself twice in the lagged calculation. The learner will count against your Retention Factor AND they'll be in a lower band than they should be.