ILR - start dates and reflecting reality?

Who told you that? the ILR specifications are specific in that It is sufficient for the date held in this field to be accurate to within a week, providing that any approximation does not result in a learner being wrongly included or excluded in the funding calculations.

HTH

Thank you Martin. Its a bit of an internal debate going on. 

I am under the impression, as long as we have supporting evidence that the learner has been working towards the FS aim - I don't know why we can't add the aim in and backdate the start date to that evidence of first learning. 

In my opinion, missing the FS aim originally was an internal administration error - by saying we cannot backdate, we are only disadvantaging the learner by basically voiding their last few months work towards the qual.

Is backdating in this circumstance ok?

Yeah, the auditor is incorrect here, are they confusing not being able to claim stuff from previous years? Even in that situation, you'd still record the real date though, you just wouldn't get paid for some of it.

Thanks Steve. I really don't know what they are confusing it with, in my opinion the financial impact doesn't matter (obviously as long as we don't over claim any funding). Just wanted to make absolutely sure we were able to backdate and reflect reality.

Thank you both! :) 

I wonder if they're getting confused with the fact you can't start a Standard without having everything signed? We couldn't back date a whole apprenticeship, but components are fine. We've definitely lost money before by being honest about a start date being in a closed year, and not being able to get the funding for the months in the year. We recorded what really happened!

Yes, I'm really unsure what they are mixing it up with Ruth but absolutely agree with you. Reflect reality even if we lose out on the cash. Thanks all!

If you follow the advice of the auditor you would be over claiming funding which is an audit issue.