Change to Starts Due to Hiring Grant Incentive

I don't see a need to reduce the price or planned OTJ hours as you aren't reducing for RPL, providing you're delivering the same content, just over a reduced period of time.

Thanks Chloe. I guess I'm concerned that we will omit the first September block for the October starters, so in effect, will be omitting this from the planned delivery.....

I'll go back to the delivery team to see if they can deliver the missed September sessions elsewhere in the reduced  timescale. 

Yes, the problem there is going to be delivering the OTJ, not the duration (which I'm not aware of being mandatory at 24 months for any Standard?) because you'll still have to hit the amount on the Standard.

Thanks Steve Hewitt - luckily, the planned OtJ hours are way above the published minimum. I think they could easily reduce the OtJ hours for the October starts, but then we will have mixed economies - September starters with one set of planned hours and October starters with another set of planned hours. As both groups will be charged the same amount (full funding band maximum if no RPL) , I *think* this would be questioned by auditors ....or would it? Another colleague has suggested maybe not, as the October incentive means DfE / Auditors will be aware of providers making these types of adjustments.

Heh, all I'll say is that if you've got auditors going *that* deep into those PDSAT reports then your audit is going *very* well because they haven't found anything actually important!!! But yes, the answer is "we chose to do it this way, here is the breakdown of our expenditure for it, get your nose out" (and, remember, making a larger profit off one cohort is not against the rules).

If anything, would almost be tempted to slim down the September starts' hours to match the October cohort...

Ha - they did go that deep into our DSATs! But....we had only just started delivering apprenticeships so our very small cohort numbers probably meant they had to go there..... 🙂 

Thanks!

Fair, but, as I say, as long as you can show you're not including anything ineligible in the costs then "so what?"

"We are making more money off these learners" (or a smaller loss!!!) is actually perfectly acceptable. The only thing those reports are really useful for is "are you charging less for any members off staff who are also an apprentice?" (because we can't make a profit on those).