Form

Points to note and changes to the revenue outturn forms

Updated 24 April 2026

Applies to England

This document highlights key points to note and outlines changes in the RO suite of forms for 2025-26.

A. General

1. The deadline for return of the RO suite of forms is Friday 24 July 2026.  MHCLG’s Director of Local Government Finance will write to CEOs to emphasise the importance of submitting high quality figures by this deadline.

2. The 24 July deadline is for provisional data, and you should resubmit your return once updated data becomes available.

3. Formal certification of Revenue Outturn is required by the deadline of Friday 9 October 2026. Certification is carried out by completing the relevant section at the foot of the form’s first worksheet (named ‘contact details’). When submitting your certified return, it is necessary that the certifier is a copy recipient of the email.

4. Please always:

i) provide the best figures you have to hand by the deadline, estimating wherever necessary

ii) provide figures for all relevant lines. NB The general guidance states “Where the authority’s service analysis is not sufficiently detailed to provide an accurate breakdown between certain lines of a form, an estimated breakdown must be given; entries on lines cannot be coupled together.”

5. Updated general and item-specific guidance documents are also linked in the launch email alongside the form and this note. Following focus group discussions with a number of authorities, a dedicated guidance document has been developed to illustrate the new required approach to reporting recharged management and support services. Please ensure you are familiar with these new requirements and have reviewed the guidance. 

6. If you have any questions, please first consult the guidance documents. If you have any other issues or questions, contact us via: lgf1.revenue@communities.gov.uk.

B. New management and support service column

7. This year, a new column has been introduced to RO1-6 to capture the amount of gross total expenditure that attributable to recharged management and support services. This automatically sums into RO6 line 489 to net off gross expenditure initially recorded there. This column should not be used if you directly allocate management and support service expenditure. Please read the dedicated guidance document to understand what should be included.

8. A webinar will be held on 30 April, for which you should have received a registration link. Please join to find out more about the new requirement and ask questions about how to approach reporting.

C. Updated list of grants and pre-populated values

9. The list of named grants has been updated.  Please be sure to enter all amounts only within the cells that are formatted in a bordered cell, and note that multiple grants can be grouped together into a single line, where appropriate or necessary.

10.  Amounts have been pre-populated into data items where figures were available and where it was proportionate to do this. You should check these figures and you should type over the pre-populated amount if you have an updated figure.

D. Lines that have been added, removed, or changed

11. The following lines have been removed from the RO suite of forms:

• RO3 lines 77 and 79 have been consolidated into lines 76 and 78 respectively
• RO4 line 126 has been split in two (across line 126 and 127) to separate out HRA depreciation
• RO4 lines 127-130 have been allocated new line numbers to accommodate the new depreciation line
• RO3 lines 603 and 604 have been added to break down ‘other income’ received from the NHS for provision of adult social care
• RO1-6 memo items to capture non-management and support service recharges between service areas (only to be used if shared service costs are recharged within RO rather than allocated before recording)

12. For all lines above, please consult our specific guidance for more details of what should be recorded.

E. Reporting of debt costs

13. To improve the clarity and quality of the data collected on debt management costs, a new memorandum table was added last year to the RSm form. The table consists of six cells which requires local authorities to report on ‘interest costs’, ‘finance cost of credit arrangements’ and ‘revenue cost of the repayment of the principal of debt’ under the General Fund and Housing Revenue Account. Please note that completion of the table is mandatory from this year. 

F. Reserves

14. Reserves levels for 1/4/2025 have been pre-populated with figures provided for 31/3/2025 in your authority’s RO 2024-25. (Please note that these reflect the latest published figures for RO 2024-25, and thus are as provided up to November 2025.) You should check and update these figures by typing over the pre-populated amount, if appropriate.

15. As well as checking the reserves levels figures (rows 911-914, 1023-1027 & 916) for 1 April 2025, you need to enter the reserve levels for 31 March 2026. The change in reserves levels from each row feeds into the relevant appropriations lines (797, 811-816).

16. Please note that you must not enter figures directly into row 915. The cells in this row contain formulae adding the ‘other earmarked reserves’ sub-category rows 1023-1027.  This means that you must allocate ‘other earmarked reserves’ levels among the following sub-categories.

• 1023 Other earmarked reserves: Contractual commitments
• 1024 Other earmarked reserves: Planned future revenue and capital spending
• 1025 Other earmarked reserves: Specific risks
• 1026 Other earmarked reserves: Budget stabilisation
• 1027 Other earmarked reserves: other exceptional elements

MHCLG Local Government Finance Data Collection Team
24 April 2026