Correspondence

DfE Update further education: 8 July 2026

Published 8 July 2026

Applies to England

Action: DfE education and skills agreements and accountability agreements for 2026 to 2027 funding year

Further Education (FE) providers will shortly be able to sign their funding offer letter for 16 to 19 and Department for Work and Pensions grant-funded adult skills fund provision through manage your education and skills funding.

Providers will be notified by email that there is a document awaiting signature.

The accompanying updated terms and conditions (along with associated schedules) will be available on DfE education and skills agreements and accountability agreements for 2026 to 2027.

You must review your funding offer letter and any agreement terms and conditions, sign and return on or before Friday 31 July 2026 to receive payment in August 2026.

Action: Download your post-16 monitoring reports

From August 2026, we will move the platform behind the post‑16 monitoring dashboard to a new system  . This change will not affect how the dashboard looks or how you access reports.

We do not anticipate any disruption to the adult reports during the transition. However, some 16 to 19 reports may be unavailable during the move until R14. We recommend you download your R10 and R11 post‑16 monitoring   reports to keep access to recent data.

The dashboard highlights potential data and funding issues so you can act early, therefore we advise reviewing your reports regularly to maintain accurate data and funding.

Information: FE funding update for 2026 to 2027 and 2027 to 2028 financial years

On Wednesday 1 July 2026, we announced the 2026 and 2027 school teacher pay awards alongside additional funding to support costs for 2026 to 2027 and 2027 to 2028 financial years.

Colleges and other FE providers will also receive around £120 million in the 2026 to 2027 financial year, rising to around £365 million in 2027 to 2028 financial year. This funding is intended to support key priorities, including staff recruitment and retention.

This additional funding will come from DfE budgets.

Together with additional funding for 16 to 19 provision in schools and academies (from within the overall schools funding envelope), around £170 million will be available for post-16 funding in 2026 to 2027 financial year.

We will deliver this funding by: 

• increases to national funding and disadvantage rates
• increasing components 2 and 3 of the Post-16 National Insurance Contributions grant

We have published updated rates and further details today at the links above.

From April 2027, employer contribution rates for the Teachers’ pension scheme will decrease; funding for the employer contributions grants will be reduced to reflect the decrease in pension costs.

Information: Publication of the college financial handbook 

We have published the college financial handbook 2026, which will come into effect on 1 August 2026.

It describes the financial responsibilities of colleges, reflecting their status as charitable corporations acting in the public interest and classified as central government bodies.

It applies to all FE and sixth form college corporations, and designated institutions who have an accountability agreement with the Secretary of State for Education.

The main changes from last year’s edition are detailed in the ‘Summary’ section.

Further details can be found in the Dear Accounting Officer letter published today. 

Feedback: Help us improve the 16 to 19 business case process

We are improving our 16 to 19 business case process. If you have experience completing or submitting these business cases, we would like to speak with you to learn what works well, and what challenges you face as education providers.

We will be running a series of online interviews between Wednesday 8 and Tuesday 14 July. Sessions will take place through Microsoft Teams and will last up to 45 minutes.

If you would like to take part, please complete our short sign-up form and a researcher will be in touch to book a session with you.

Feedback: Take part in our further education data and enrolment research

We are looking for FE provider staff to take part in research on learner data and enrolment processes.

Your feedback will help us understand current processes, challenges and opportunities across the sector. This insight will support improvements to data systems.

We want to hear from people involved in:

• enrolment or attendance data
• management information systems
• reporting and data analysis
• related administrative processes

The research will consist of a one-to-one Microsoft Teams interview lasting up to 60 minutes.

Interviews will take place between Monday 13 July and Friday 7 August 2026.

Register your interest if you would like to take part. We welcome responses from a wide range of FE providers and roles.

Feedback: Tell us about your experience of our funding service 

If you receive education and skills funding, we want to hear about your experience.

Please complete this short survey by Wednesday 22 July 2026. It should take you 5 to 10 minutes to complete.

We aspire to run an excellent education and skills funding service that gives providers as much certainty as possible.

The survey runs once a year and asks whether we deliver:

• certainty on what we pay you and when
• clarity on how to comply with funding rules
• services that are accessible and easy to use
• answers when you have funding-related queries

We will keep your personal data confidential, and your feedback will help us to improve the service.