Apprenticeships are funded under the Levy scheme for apprenticeships in England.
If you operate in England and your annual payroll is over £3 million, you pay a levy of 0.5% of your payroll into a digital account.
This account is exclusively used to fund apprenticeship programmes.
The Government will top up the employer’s account with a 10% bonus, so effectively you will draw £1.10 for every £1.00 you put in.
If your organisation is not required to pay the levy, you will only pay 5% of the cost of the apprenticeship programme. The Government pays the remaining 95%.
Additional funding is available for certain other criteria.
Funds in the Digital Apprenticeship Service (DAS) account are exclusively used to pay for apprenticeship programmes. Funds will expire 24 months after they enter a digital account unless they are spent on apprenticeship training.
Once you’ve agreed to invest in apprenticeship training, and the apprenticeship has started, monthly payments will be automatically drawn from your digital account and sent to us as the provider.
This spreads the cost over the lifetime of the apprenticeship. You will see funds entering the digital account each month as you pay the levy, and funds leaving the account regularly each month as you pay for training.
You can choose the training you’d like your apprentices to receive and an approved training provider using the registers available on the National Apprenticeship Service. The 5% share of your programme costs will be invoiced directly by ARU once your apprentice has started their programme.
Our team of experts is here to help form your organisation's offering and guide you through the process.