Introduction
About this guidance.
The consistent financial reporting framework (CFR) provides a standard template for schools to report their income and expenditure in the financial year 2024 to 2025. The information collected is used to support benchmarking and enables comparative reports to be produced for governors and local authorities.
The CFR framework applies to maintained schools and pupil referral units. It is optional for nurseries and non-maintained special schools.
Governing bodies of maintained schools must provide their local authorities with a financial statement, presented in accordance with the approved headings and sub-headings set out in the Consistent Financial Reporting (England) Regulations 2012 and in compliance with the established accounting practices of the local authority.
This includes:
- all allocations and other income received in a financial year including any balances brought forward from the previous financial year
- all expenditure within that financial year
- a summary of the school’s financial position at the end of that financial year
This guidance provides the definitions for each CFR schedule approved heading code to assist schools in mapping income and expenditure to the appropriate areas of the CFR framework.
The guidance is aimed at:
- local authority finance officers
- school finance officers
- business managers
- bursars
The Department for Education (DfE) uses COLLECT (collections on-line for learning, education, children and teachers) to capture CFR data from schools and local authorities. You can read further information about the CFR framework and data collection.