Finance - Changes to Consistent Financial Reporting (CFR) coding

The new 2018-19 Consistent Financial Reporting (CFR) guidance has split the E28 bought in professional services code between E28A and E28B to distinguish between non-PFI expenditure and PFI expenditure. Only PFI schools will need to add E28B as a new ledger code. There is no need for any school to create E28A. The existing ledger code of E28 will be adequate for this purpose and Schools Financial Services will report to the DFE appropriately when the information is collated from schools returns.

BPS will be updated centrally to add E28B. (Only to be used by PFI schools).

This is the excerpt from the Consistent Financial Reporting (CFR) guidelines:

E28a: bought-in professional services - other (except PFI).

Includes:

• Professional services, consultancy and advice to staff and governors purchased from the local authority or an
  external party relating to:
  • management
  • finance
  • legal
  • personnel
  • premises
  • clerking service, if a clerk is not directly employed by the school
  • free school meals (FSM) eligibility checking, including sums de-delegated by the local authority
  • any security personnel employed to bank revenue funding.

E28b: bought-in professional services - other (PFI).

From 2018 to 2019 we are asking for payments from the school to the local authority for the cost of a Private Finance Initiative contract to be entered separately as E28b. The purpose of this is to collect data on the cost of PFI to individual maintained schools, in order to inform consideration of how PFI costs can best be funded through the national funding formula in future. We already collect this data from academies but not maintained schools.

These payments are likely to include the whole of any PFI factor that the school receives through the local authority’s funding formula, but in many cases will also include a further contribution from the school’s delegated budget.

Excludes:

• cost of staff where they are directly employed by the school (see E04 - E07)
• consultancy and advice for curriculum (see E27).

Contact Details

Schools Financial Services
Telephone: 03000 41 54 15
Email: schoolsfinancialservices@kent.gov.uk