Confirm your information and apply
To confirm the information in your application is correct, check it before you submit it online.
When you’ve completed your application you need to check that the information in it is correct. To do this, create or update your application summary by following the instructions in the ‘Complete’ section under ‘Application summary’. Then if needed, you can go back into your application and change it.
If you decide you do not want to submit your application, click ‘Withdraw’. A message appears to check that you do want to withdraw the application.
Click ‘No’ if you do not want to withdraw it.
Click ‘Yes’ if you do want to withdraw it. You’ll see a screen message confirming that you’ve successfully withdraw the application. This application will not be submitted to RPA, and you cannot open it again but you can create a new application while the green application buttons are available.
Click ‘Back’ to return to the application screen (where you’ll see the application status is now ‘Withdrawn’ and the application is no longer ‘Active’).
If you have checked your application summary and the information in your application is correct, click ‘Submit’ to apply for Capital Grants.
If your application meets all the requirements for the grant and you have completed the declaration, the screen will confirm that your application has ‘submitted successfully’ to RPA.
Click ‘Print’ if you want to print and keep the confirmation for your records.
Click ‘Back’ to return to the application screen (where you’ll see that the application status has changed to ‘Submitted’ and the application is still ‘Active’. It also shows the date and time your application was submitted.
The deadline for RPA to receive your supporting documents is given in the ‘Supporting documents and evidence’ section.
Application fails to submit
If your application fails to submit, a screen message will tell you this. It will also show the reasons why it did not submit with a red warning box beside it.
Read this message fully by using the scroll bar to the right of the message. You may find it useful to print and save the message. You may be able to do this by clicking the button on the right side of the ‘mouse’ or ‘touchpad’, and choosing the print or save options.
Click ‘Back’ to return to the application screen.
Check and correct all of the sections detailed in the message before you ‘Submit’ your application again.
The information below gives examples of some of the reasons why you cannot submit your application. It will help you to identify what you need to do before you submit your application again:
Your application exceeds the maximum value allowed or is below the minimum value allowed
You need to ‘Open’ your application from the Countryside Stewardship Applications screen and click the relevant capital item options under ‘Edit your Application’:
- Capital – Boundaries, Trees and Orchards
- Capital – Water Quality
- Capital – Air Quality
Then:
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If you have not selected any capital items, select all those you want to include in the application then click ‘Close’
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If you have already selected your capital items, you have exceeded the maximum grant value of £20,000 for the option group and need to reduce the items selected.
All responses on the Eligibility form must be completed
From the Countryside Stewardship Applications screen, ‘Open’ your application and click on ‘Scheme Eligibility’ under ‘Edit your Application’. Answer ALL of the eligibility questions and click ‘Save’ then ‘Close’.
You must select ‘Yes’ in the Declarations section to be able to proceed with your Application
From the Countryside Stewardship Applications screen, ‘Open’ your application and click ‘Declarations and Undertakings’ under ‘Edit your Application’. Click ‘Yes’ to confirm that you accept the declaration then click ‘Close’.
After you’ve submitted your application and returned to the application screen, you may see 2 green buttons beside your submitted application details:
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Application summary
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Evidence checklist – if this is not visible on your screen read ‘Countryside Stewardship grants’ on GOV.UK.
Application summary and Evidence checklist
You may have already created these at the ‘Edit your application’ screen while you were completing your application. You should ‘generate’ and ‘download’ them again after you complete your application to make sure they contain everything you’ve put into your application. The checklist tells you what evidence you must submit to RPA by the application deadline and what evidence you should keep until you’re asked for it. (If the checklist is not visible on our screen read ‘Countryside Stewardship grants’.) As explained earlier in the ‘View and print documents’ section.
You may want to print or save your application summary and keep for your records.
Read the ‘Supporting documents and evidence’ section for details about how to send your supporting documents and any evidence that must be submitted to RPA.
RPA must receive your online application, supporting documents and evidence that must be submitted to RPA by midnight on 30 April 2021. You may also need to keep some evidence until you’re asked for it – read below.
Supporting documents
For example,
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Application map(s) (read Annex 1)
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A Land Ownership Consent form (if required)
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Catchment Sensitive Farming Officer (CSFO) approval (if required)
Evidence
Some evidence RPA must receive by midnight on 30 April 2021, and some evidence you should keep until you’re asked for it.
Read about the requirements for each option or item in your evidence checklist or ‘Countryside Stewardship grants’ on GOV.UK.
How to submit your supporting documents and evidence
You can scan and email all the documents above to ruralpayments@defra.gov.uk. The maximum size of emails we can accept is 32MB. For security reasons, we cannot accept discs, USB pen drives or other external storage media.
You must put your SBI and Application ID number in the email and on all documents. Also use ‘Application – CS Capital Grants’ as the email subject heading.
You can submit digital photos by email, but do not scan printed photos as the quality is not good enough.
Or you can post the documents to RPA using the address in the ‘More information and Contact us’ section. We recommend you get ‘proof of posting’.
If your application meets the eligibility criteria, you will be offered an agreement.
You’ll receive confirmation regardless of whether or not your application has been successful. If it’s successful you’ll receive an agreement offer letter. The Agreement Start Date will be set out in the agreement documents contained with the agreement offer letter.
If you want to accept the agreement offer you must return the signed acceptance declaration to RPA within 20 working days of receiving it. If you do not accept the offer in time, it will be withdrawn. The person signing the acceptance declaration must have at least ‘View’ business permission level, and ‘Submit’ permission for CS Agreements in the Rural Payments service.
If you enter into a Capital Grant by accepting the offer (an ‘Agreement Holder’) you cannot modify, extend or amend the Capital Grant. You must either accept or decline the offer.