16 to 19 funding allocations

16 to 19 funding allocations

We calculate funding for institutions using the 16 to 19 funding formula.

Funding allocations are drivencalculated byusing lagged student recruitmentvolumes and the funding formula that includes factors that reflect student retention, higher cost subjects, disadvantaged students and area costs. Our main collection page includes further information about each element within the 16 to 19 funding formula.

We supplement the funding calculated using the 16 to 19 funding formula with additional funding for high needs students and funding that provides financial support to students to help with their education costs.

Information for academic year 20252026 to 20262027

We’ve published details on the key changes to funding for 20252026 to 20262027.

Our pages on funding allocation statement guides and allocation calculation toolkits will help you to understand how we’ve calculated your funding.

Allocations timeline

We will publish updates to the timeline as we deliver funding allocations. The latest news column on the timeline shows updates.

Month	Activity	Latest news
December 20242025	64 December 20242025 is the individualised learner record (ILR) R04 deadline. This is the first 16 to 19 data return for 2025 to 2026.	The R04 data return is now closed.
JanuaryFebruary 20252026	Publication of outcomes of the high needs place change process for 20252026 to 2026.2027.	WeRead havethe publishedhigh theneeds outcomesplace change data outcomes: 2026 to 2027. spreadsheet.
February 20252026	5 February 20252026 is the ILR R06 deadline.	The R06 data return is now closed.
March 20252026	We will issueupload supporting guides and allocation calculation toolkits files to Document exchange containing funding factors to institutions.institutions and publish guidance on GOV.UK. We will begin to issueupload allocationsallocation statements to Document exchange to all institutions and publish supportingguidance guides.on GOV.UK. We aim to issue the majority of the allocations by the end of the month.	WeNo have issued the majority of funding allocations.news
April and May 20252026	BusinessWe caseswill mustupload bethe submittedremaining withinallocations 4to weeksDocument ofexchange receivingin yourApril. fundingThis allocationyear, statementwe forwill anyonly accept business cases inaffecting relationacademic year 2026 to a2027. significantWe datano errorlonger oraccept exceptionalbusiness circumstancescases affecting theprevious allocation.years. ThisSubmit excludesyour institutionsbusiness incase scopewithin 20 working days of receiving your allocation statement. Non-term time does not count as working days, so the highworking needsday placecount changewill processpause becauseduring wethese openedperiods. aWe 2-weekwill windownot foraccept enquirieslate inbusiness Januarycases, 2025. so plan ahead to ensure your submission is on time. We will review and process business cases and aim to complete these over the summer.	For theThis 16excludes toinstitutions 19 allocations issued in March/April,scope of the businesshigh caseneeds timeplace periodchange relatingprocess tobecause significantthe dataenquiry errorswindow orclosed exceptionalon circumstances27 affectingFebruary the2026.	No allocations is now closed.news
July and August 20252026	We will issue funding agreements and contracts to institutions either directly or through the lead contact. Agreements and contracts are then signed and returned by the funded organisation.	WeNo have issued all of the funding agreements and contracts.news
August and September 20252026	We will make the first payment to local authorities (in respect of schools with sixth forms) and directly to academies, colleges and other institutions.	WeNo have issued the majority of the payments to institutions.news

Business cases for major data errors

When you should submit a business case

You should only submit a business casescase if you have made a significant error in your 16 to 19 schoolsschool census or or ILR data. Thisdata. shouldSubmit bea bybusiness exceptioncase and only after you have received your funding allocation statement.statement for academic year 2026 to 2027.

How to submit a business case

Use ourthe customer help portal to submit ayour case. ChooseSelect theFunding funding and paymentspayments, option, then allocationsAllocations and business cases.cases. Do not upload business cases to Document exchange until you have completed this step because we will not see them.

Timelines

If whenappropriate, submittingwe awill businesssend case

Foryou casesa thatpre-populated wetemplate receiveso withyou fullcan informationprovide withinthe 4evidence weekswe need.

Your head of institution must authorise the allocationbusiness statementcase beingor issued,the wecase aimmust toinclude communicateevidence outcomesof fordelegated straightforwardauthority.

When casesnot overto thesubmit summer.

a business case

We will neednot longeraccept:

• extracts tofrom investigateallocation morecalculation complextoolkits cases,with orcorrections
• templates casesfrom withprevious missingyears
• cases information,submitted andafter wethe deadline

We will actionnot anyaccept adjustmentsbusiness tocases yourrelating allocationto asany aacademic contractyear variation.

Whenbefore not2026 to submit a case

2027.

This process does not cover business cases for high needs place funding for institutions that are within scope of the high needs place change notification process.

For institutions returning the the ILR, we will not accept business cases where an error in the 20232024 to 20242025 R04 (or R46) has reduced the ratio for the 20252026 to 20262027 allocation. This is because any such error will have also resulted in an equivalent increase in the 20242025 to 20252026 allocation.

FromWhere we accepted a business case for academic year 20262025 to 2027,2026, we will onlynot accept businessa casescase affectingfor thatthe academicsame year.funding Weelement willagain notfor acceptacademic businessyear cases2026 affectingto previous years.2027.

HowExamples

If towe submitaccepted a case

Usemaths ourand customerEnglish helpcondition portalof funding correction for 2025 to submit2026 a(using case.2023 Chooseto the2024 fundingdata), and paymentsa option,data thenerror allocationsis andmade businessthat cases.impacts Theon headmaths and English condition of funding again for 2026 to 2027 (using 2024 to 2025 data), we will not accept the case. This is because the institution mustis authorisenot allfixing businesstheir cases.data errors. This approach applies every year.

IfWhere youa havebusiness anycase queriescovers aboutmultiple usingfunding Documentelements exchange,in seeeither our Documentor exchangeboth supportconsecutive guide.years, we will exclude the elements from the 2026 to 2027 case that were present in the 2025 to 2026 case and only assess the elements of the 2026 to 2027 case that are new. Table 1 shows this example.

If

Table you1

2025 doto not2026 followbusiness thiscase processelements	2026 to 2027 business case elements	Elements considered in 2026 to 2027 business case
maths and weEnglish receivecondition yourof funding	maths and English condition of funding	NO
high value courses premium	high value courses premium	NO
-	maths and English funding	YES
programme cost weighting	high value courses premium	YES

We will calculate whether or not the case afterpasses the deadline,materiality threshold after we willhave notremoved bethe ableelements present in both years business cases from the 2026 to accept2027 it.business case.

Decision timelines

WhenIf appropriate,you submit a straightforward case with complete information by the deadline, we willaim sendto give you a pre-populateddecision templateby afterthe youend contactof usJune 2026. However, resources to makecorrect sureprovider weerrors haveare alllimited theand evidenceit wemay need.take longer to complete all cases.

More complex cases, or cases missing information, will take longer. We will notaction accept:any late adjustments through a contract variation.

• extracts

  We fromwill allocationset calculationdeadlines toolkitswhen withwe associatedrequest corrections

• templatesmore frominformation. previousIf years
• casesyou receivedmiss afterthese thedeadlines deadline

and you do not tell us about delays, we will close your case.

Thresholds for business cases

We apply standard minimum thresholds to decide whether we will consider a case.

For cases affecting your total programme funding, including your T Level allocation, there must be:

• be an overall impact of 5% on total programme funding or £100,000, whichever is lower

Whilelower. thisThis threshold remains the same as last academic year, we will now calculate this using all of the elements included in total programme funding (see ‘Figure 1: 16 to 19 funding formula’).year.

For casesall notother coveredcases, above, there must be:

• be an overall impact of 5% of the funding related to that element

element. For example, if the case relates to discretionary bursary funding, the 5% would be in relation to the total discretionary bursary funding.

WeAs haveadvised removedin Tthe Levelthresholds under-deliveryfor tolerancesbusiness forcases section of our academic year 2025 to 2026 soguidance, from 2026 to 2027 we have removedchanged how the specificthreshold thresholdsworks. forFrom T2026 Levels.to Institutions2027, willwhen notwe beagree financiallya impactedcase, ifwe theywill correctdeduct theirthe datathreshold errorsand inonly theirpay autumnfunding returnsabove forthat academicamount. yearInstitutions 2025will need to 2026.fund the first 5% or £100,000 of the error, whichever is lower. We willhave reviseintroduced allocationsthis in-yearstep againstto actualcreate datafairness followingwithin the Tbusiness Levelcase reconciliation.process.

Reviews and appeals

FromThere 2026is tono 2027,appeals weprocess for business case decisions. We will alsoonly changereview howa thecase thresholdif works.you Whenprovide evidence that we agreedid anot case,follow wethe willprocess deductin this guidance. You must send this evidence within 20 working days of receiving the thresholddecision.

Our funding model uses lagged data to calculate the forthcoming academic year allocations. This provides certainty and onlyallows payproviders fundingto overplan their budgets. It also ensures that amount.DfE Forcan example,control iftotal allocations in line with budget controls.

There may be times when the samelagged 5%model ordoes £100,000not (whicheverreflect a large increase in student numbers. This is lower)why thresholdwe werehave toan remain,in-year institutionsgrowth willprocess. needThis provides extra funding, subject to fundaffordability, using the firstin-year 5%R04 or £100,000census ofdata (data from 1 November). This ensures that all increases in funding are considered equitably and institutions are treated fairly across the error.sector.

Data sources

Data sources for 16 to 19 and post-16 high needs funding for academic year 20252026 to 20262027

This section sets out the methods we will use to determine the number of students attracting funding in 20252026 to 2026.2027. We have set this out by institution type.

From academic year 2025 to 2026, we will include all T Level data in the calculation of funding factors.

Schools, academies, free schools, studio schools and university technical colleges

We base lagged numbers on 20242025 to 20252026 students in the autumn 20242025 census. We fund some academies on estimated numbers where their funding agreement states this.

Further education (FE) colleges and some other FE or higher education institutions

We take the number of eligible students with a reference date of 1 November 20242025 based on R04 (2024(2025 to 2025).2026). To count, students must have at least one aim funded under the 16 to 19 funding model that starts on or before this date.

We multiply this by the ratio of 1 November to all-year student numbers based on R04 (2023(2024 to 2024)2025) and the R14 return for that year.

We compare this figure with the student numbers calculated from R06 (2024(2025 to 2025),2026), both the year-to-date (as at 1 February) figure and the number recruited by 1 November (R46) to determine the final student number methodology that we will use: R04 multiplied by the ratio, R46 multiplied by the ratio or R06.

Independent learning providers

You can see the methodology we have used in the ‘total student numbers, student number methodology used’ box on your statement.

Depending on the profile of recruitment for the individual provider, we will either use:

1. a 12-month rolling figure for February 20242025 to January 20252026 based on R14 (2023(2024 to 2024)2025) and R06 (2024(2025 to 2025)2026) data
2. the same approach as set out above for FE colleges
3. the average of approaches 1 and 2

There may be a delay in issuing allocations for institutions where we use R06 data.

Local authorities and some other FE institutions

If using in-year data is not appropriate, we will use a full-year figure based on R14 (2023(2024 to 2024).2025). We compare this figure with the student numbers calculated from R06 (2024(2025 to 2025),2026), year-to-date (as at 1 February) figure to determine the final student number methodology that we will use: R14 or R06.

Maintained special schools

We allocate post-16 high needs place funding directly to local authorities. Local authorities then determine the post-16 place funding to allocate to individual maintained special schools.

Special academies

We use published 20242025 to 20252026 academic year high needs place numbers, revised by place changes notified to us by local authorities in November 2024.2025.

Special post-16 institutions (SPIs)

We will allocate programme funding (element 1) and high needs funding (element 2) using counts of valid students from 20242025 to 2025 2026 ILR R06 data returns. We will use a reference date of 1 February 2025.2026.

Lagged approach

For those institutions normally subject to funding based on lagged student numbers, the lagged approach does not apply where there is a material change in the volume of provision offered by the institution. In those cases, we remove the institution from the lagged approach and we calculate funded student numbers as set out in the funding rates and formula guidance.

Formula elements

These are the methods we will use to determine the other formula elements for institutions with 16 to 19 funding in 20252026 to 2026.2027.

Data sources for formula elements/Institution type	Institutions making ILR return	Institutions making census return	Institutions with no historical data
Retention/SizeRetention, size of programme/Programmeprogramme, programme cost weighting/Disadvantageweighting, disadvantage block 2 instances/Highinstances, high value courses premium and English and maths funding	R14 20232024 to 20242025	Autumn census 20242025 (end-year 20232024 to 20242025 data)	National average for institution type
Disadvantage block 1 factor/instancesfactor, instances and discretionary bursary instances	R14 20232024 to 20242025	Autumn census 20242025 (end-year 20232024 to 20242025 data)	Local authority average for institution type
Large programmes	20222023 to 20232024 young people’s matched admin dataset (YPMAD)	20222023 to 20232024 YPMAD	NoNot impactapplicable
T Level funded students and Industry placements/Conditionplacements	R04 2025 to 2026 and T Level data collection	Autumn census 2025 (2025 to 2026 data) and T Level data collection	T Level data collection
Maths and English condition of funding	R14 20232024 to 20242025	Autumn census 20242025 (end-year 20232024 to 20242025 data)	NoNot impactapplicable
Advanced maths premium	20242025 to 20252026 R04 data with a reference date of 1 November 20242025	Autumn census 20242025 (2024(2025 to 20252026 data)	If institution is open in 20242025 to 2025,2026, then then ILR/census or census as appropriate. If not open in 20242025 to 2025,2026, then no impact
Core maths premium	20242025 to 20252026 R04 data with a reference date of 1 November 20242025	Autumn census 20242025 (2024(2025 to 20252026 data)	If institution is open in 20242025 to 2025,2026, then then ILR/census or census as appropriate. If not open in 20242025 to 2025,2026, then no impact

Contact us

If you have questions after reading our guidance, or if there’s anything else you need help with, you can find more support in our customer help centre.

Published allocations

You can find a list of our previously published allocations transparency data on ourin the funding educationallocations forsection 16on toour 19 year olds collection page.