We have prepared a Remote Working policy which provides a template for managing remote working consistently and securely. This can be found within the General Business Management section of the toolkit.
We have added an annual leave request form to the toolkit, for support staff on a 52 weeks per year contract to request annual leave. We have also uploaded an Annual Leave Record which can be used to record the annual leave that an individual has taken within the holiday period. Both resources can be found within the Personnel section of the toolkit.
The Data Protection policy has been updated with some minor amendments made.
The Special Payments policy has been updated to reflect the Academy Trust Handbook 2022.
The Accounting Officer Skills Analysis has been updated, with 3 new questions built into the analysis. The new questions relate to linking financial planning with strategic objectives, related party transactions and understanding the role of the CFO.
The Trustee Declaration Form has been updated. This is a minor change to reflect that trustees are agreeing to adhere to the Academy Trust Handbook 2022, rather than the 2021 edition.
This checklist is based on the DfE publication 'Meeting digital and technology standards in schools and colleges' which sets 12 standards that schools should be meeting with regards cyber security. We have taken each of these standards and the technical requirements that the DfE have said would lead to compliance within these areas and produced a self assessment checklist for schools/academies to use. This can be found within the Data Protection folder of the toolkit.
The budget planning tools for both maintained schools and academies have been updated for the 2023/24 year of account. This includes the budget planner, forward financial forecasting tool, combined budget planner and forecasting tool and the support and teaching staff salary cost calculator tools.
The Freedom of Information Act template Publication Scheme has been updated in line with the latest guidance from the ICO.
The website checklists have been updated to reflect an amendment the DfE made related to suggested wording schools can use to show that the most recent key stage 2 performance measures are for the 2018 to 2019 academic year.
A fixed asset register template has been added to the SBM Toolkit. This is available within the Financial Management Useful Resources folder.
Branding is not just an organisations name and logo or how something looks, it is also what makes it unique and distinctive. The trust/school brand is visible in all communications that leave your setting and everything you do and so it's important that staff understand what this means in practice and how they should be representing the trust/school brand. These template Brand Guidelines provide some suggestions of what could be shared with staff.
Annually, the Accounting Officer is required to sign a formal statement that they have met their personal responsibilities to Parliament for the resources under their control during the year. This checklist can be used to confirm the work that has been undertaken in the financial year to ensure that resources under the Accounting Officer’s control are within the boundaries of regularity. This new resource can be found within the Useful Financial Management Resources for Academies folder.
We have updated the Supplier Contract Management tool so that the contract will automatically show as 'Complete' or 'Overdue' depending on the status of the contract review. This updated tool can be found in the General School Business Management section of the toolkit.
The academy Management Accounts template for MATs has been updated (v22.2). This update corrects an issue that occurred within v22.1 where the 'Produce Reports' button was not working.
An additional question has been added to the Going Concern Assessment checking whether trustees are confident that the balance sheet is an accurate reflection of the current assets and liabilities. This can be found within the School Resource Self Assessment folder within Financial Management Tools for Academies.
A recent software update to Microsoft means that some files containing macros (a form of coding) are being identified as a potential security risk which means that the file is prevented from opening up as normal. This has meant that recently, for some toolkit users, when they try to open up some tools within Microsoft Excel their system is not permitting them to open. This is not because there is a problem with any of our files as we’ve always had macros built into them, it’s just that Excel is now treating these slightly differently and more cautiously. Please read the full article for advice on how to manage this.
The template privacy notices have been updated in line with the DfE model privacy notices.
The template Financial Regulations for Multi Academy Trusts and Single Academy Trusts have been updated in line with the Academy Trust Handbook 2022. They are available within the Policy Templates folder within the Academies Financial Management section of the toolkit.
The Supplier Contract Management Tool has been updated to v22.2 and now includes a section for recording contract indemnities. The tool is available within the General School Business Management Tools section of the toolkit.
V22.2 of the academy Support Staff Salary Cost Calculator tool has been released. This rectifies an issue which meant that for some members of staff the NI calculation was not pulling through correctly into the reports.
The Policy Tracker has been updated to reflect that the list of statutory policies from the DfE has been updated and it is no longer a requirement to have a 'Designated teacher for looked after and previously looked after children' policy.
A new resource has been added to the Financial Management section of the toolkit - a policy outlining the framework for accepting donations and fundraising support.
An example set of completed management accounts for a Multi Academy Trust have been added to the toolkit.
The 2022/23 academy staff salary cost calculators are now available to download from the Financial Management section of the toolkit.
Both the support and teaching staff salary cost calculators have been updated to include the 2022/23 national insurance contribution rates. If you have already started to use the 2022/23 salary calculators, the national insurance figures can be overtyped as follows:
April 2022
Part 1 of the table
Part 2 of the table
April 2023 is as above.
The maintained teaching staff salary cost calculator has been updated to ensure that when mid point contract changes occur, that these are reflected within the variance analysis. It also ensures that the summary table totals update to reflect the mid year contract change(s).
The template form that can be used when a 3rd party requests personal data is shared with them has been reviewed. A minor amendment made related to not including contact details within the process description.
A new resource has been added to the Governance folder, which provides a template to officially maintain records for Persons of Significant Control. This can be found in the General Business Management section of the toolkit.
A new resource has been added to the SBM Toolkit which can be used when approaching local businesses to see if they have individuals witin their organisation who would like to become a governor. This letter template contains suggested wording explaining what you are looking for and the benefits for them in becoming a governor.
This resource is available within the governance folder of the toolkit which is within the 'General School Business Management' area.
The Academy Trust Handbook 2021 (paragraph 2.51) specifies that there is certain governance documentation that the public are permitted access to. We have prepared some suggested wording that could be added to the trust/school website to show what documentation the public is permitted access to, what redactions might be applied to the documentation and what the process is for requesting access.
This resource is available within the governance folder of the toolkit which is within the 'General School Business Management' area.
The risk register has been reviewed and updated in light of the DfE's best practice recommendations. The updated risk register can be found in the Financial Management Tools folder of the toolkit.
A new resource has been added to the data protection section of the toolkit. The Police Request to Disclose Third Party Personal Data template form provides a template that could be provided when such requests are made, if the police force do not have their own form.
The Local Authority Maintained School teaching staff calculator has been updated for the 2022/23 year of account.
The budget planner, financial forecast and combined budget planner & financial forecast tool have been updated for the 2022/23 year of account. The teaching staff and support staff salary cost calculators will be uploaded shortly.
The staff privacy notice template has been updated to reflect the current DfE model privacy notice.
The management accounts commentary templates have been amended to ensure that all charts can be edited. We identified that in the previous versions, the cashflow forecast chart was not allowing users to edit the data.
A model skills audit that governors could be asked to complete on an annual basis, along with a tool to help consolidate and analyse the responses are now available on the toolkit. Visit the Governance folder within the General School Business Management Resources area.
This policy has been amended to reference the Academies Trust Handbook 2021. It can be found within the academies financial management section of the toolkit.
A template asset management plan (AMP) has been uploaded to the SBM Toolkit. The AMP will enable you to produce robust documentation to support your estate monitoring and assist in formulating future plans. The tool is designed to also centralise the information required to complete the Land and & Buildings Collections Tool, comply with the DfE GEMS guidance for good estate management and the GEMS self assessment tool.
The pupil, staff and trustee/governor privacy notices have been updated to reflect the latest DfE model privacy notices. The changes are minor, mainly relating to referencing the UK GDPR rather than the EU GDPR.
We have made an amendment to the academy support staff salary calculator so that you can now add a predicted inflationary percentage uplift to all 5 years within the tool for forecasting purposes.
The Absence Management tool has been updated to include the September 2021 dates onwards.
We have recently updated the template that could be used for the commentary section of academy monthly management accounts. The key performance indicators are recommendations, but schools should personalise these based on their own context and requirements.
This Scheme of Delegation is designed to summarise the key tasks that take place within the support functions of a school and document who is accountable and responsible for completing these tasks. We have also published an example version of the scheme of delegation with roles and responsiblities completed to show how it could be used.
The Policy Tracker tool has been updated to reflect an update to the DfE statutory policies documentation. Reference to NQTs has been amended to Early Career Teachers (ECTs). This updated tool can be found in the General Business Management Tools folder.
The Month End Accounting Workbook has been updated ready for the 2021/22 year of account. This is available to download in the Financial Management Tools (academy) section of the toolkit.
The MAT and SAT template Financial Regulations have been updated to reflect the Academy Trust Handbook 2021. These can be found in the Financial Management Useful Financial Resources folder.
We have received some queries from schools asking what type of shredder they should purchase for securely disposing of records containing personal data. Whilst we can't recommend a particular shredder, this document provides some information on the styles of shredder available and the level of security that might be appropriate.
We have converted the ESFA model trustee report and governance statement 2020-21 from a PDF document to a Word document to aid academies in completing the report. This can be found within the Financial Management Tools folder (for academies).
We have updated the Year End Tools ready for the 2020/21 year end processes. These can all be found within the Financial Management Tools folder.
A year in the life of a school business professional. This planner is designed to assist with providing a framework for the common tasks that need to happen throughout the academic year. A useful tool to support with planning.
The Academy Common Government Funding Streams has been updated in line with current funding in March 2021. The resource is available in Useful Documents for Academies.
We’ve uploaded a resource to support academies with reviewing the pension contributions made on a monthly basis, ready to review against the year-end figures provided by Teachers’ Pensions.
We identified that there was an error with some of the expenditure formulas pulling into the summary worksheets in the previous version of this tool. We have corrected this in the latest version of the tool – v2.5 – which is available now to download in the toolkit.
A brief guide to data protection has been added to the toolkit which could be used as part of the induction for temporary staff or volunteers.
We have amended the policy tracker so that the policies listed within the Academies Financial Handbook as being a ‘must’ for academies are shown as statutory policies on the tracker. We have also added that Financial Regulations and the Scheme of Delegation are policies that both academies and maintained schools should have in place.
We have made a small amendment to this tool where some of the cells within the budget planning section of the tool have been locked to prevent users from accidentally typing data into the wrong cells.
We have uploaded a template report that could be used to provide trustees with a termly internal scrutiny update. This includes reference to progress against the external audit, the internal scrutiny plan, the school resource self-evaluation. The template is available under Financial Management > Resources for Academies > Useful Documents
We have created a simple flowchart to explain how to treat government grants within the month-end accounting process related to accruals and deferrals. The resource is available in the Useful Financial Management Tools section.
This template contains suggested wording to give pupils and parents an insight into how information about pupils is used in online streaming and recording of lessons. The template is available within the General Data Protection Regulations resources.
