Employers

Payments for hiring a young apprentice

Employers and training providers could get £1,000 each for taking on an apprentice who is either: aged 16 to 18 years old, or aged 19 to 25 years old and has an education, health and care (EHC) plan or has been in the care of their local authority.

What you can use the payment for

You can spend it on any costs associated with supporting an apprentice in the workplace. For example, on uniforms, your apprentice’s travel or their salary.

How to get the payment

Employers do not need to take any action. We use confirmation from the training provider that an apprentice is eligible and calculate payments. Training providers must get consent from apprentices who have EHC plans or have been in the care of their local authority to share this information with the employer. Payment will not be calculated for employers if consent is not provided.

When you’ll get paid

The first payment of £500 should be paid to the employer by the training provider after 90 days of the apprenticeship training start date. The final payment of £500 should be paid to the employer by the training provider after 365 days of the apprenticeship training start date. Training providers have 30 working days to make payment to employers.

Find out how to take on an apprentice

How much does an apprenticeship cost?

Businesses that have more than 50 employees, but don’t pay the apprenticeship levy, pay just 5% towards the cost of training and assessing an apprentice.

The Government pays the rest up to the funding band maximum.

Employers pay the training provider (SWDT) directly and agree on a payment schedule.

For businesses employing fewer than 50 employees, the Government will pay 100% of the apprenticeship training costs up to the band maximum for apprentices aged:

• 16 to 18
• 19 to 24 with an education, health and care plan provided by their local authority or has been in care of their local authority.

For more information please email richard.wright@bacoll.ac.uk

Levy and apprenticeship reform

Building upon the well-established best practice of South West Durham Training and Bishop Auckland College’s apprenticeship models, we will provide a seamless link to the new standards-based apprenticeships and explanation of how the new funding model will affect your business.

Embracing the new apprenticeships, we will ensure that competence stretch is matched by delivering excellent core engineering, management and leadership skills, knowledge and behaviours. We will provide a fully comprehensive service to ensure that you, as an employer, can stocktake your internal training programmes as they are very likely to be similar to existing apprenticeship provision.

Understanding the Levy

The levy was launched to encourage employers to use apprenticeship programmes, either for new staff or to upskill an existing workforce, to help reduce the skills gaps within England. The levy applies to all businesses with wage bills of more than £3m.

Our team of experts are committed to delivering bespoke advice and guidance on apprenticeships that will not only enhance your workforce but also transform your company to become a more productive and successful business.

We will help you understand your levy commitment and the benefits for levy, non-levy and companies employing fewer than 50 staff. In addition, you will be supported to plan for the effective utilisation of your levy commitments.

Finding the right apprenticeship pathway

Our Employer engagement teams will ensure that you are aware of the most appropriate apprenticeship match, to make certain that your apprentice recruitment aligns with your company’s skills and competence ambition. They will explain how you can develop your own standards based apprenticeship, specifically designed to meet the needs of your company and your industry sector.

Working in partnership Bishop Auckland College and SWDT will provide a collaborative solution and service, co-ordinating all levy payers full range of apprenticeship requirements. We will also support Non-levy paying businesses (around 98% of all businesses) who will only have to contribute 5% of the costs of an apprentice’s training, with the government paying the remaining 95% through ‘co-investment’.

We will help you to select the most suitable option to ensure the achievement of a successful ‘End Point Assessment’ (EPA). Arrangements will be made to make sure that you fully understand the structure and requirements of your selected apprenticeship and the role of the EPA’s.

Apprenticeship recruitment

As part of our comprehensive levy and apprenticeship service, our staff will provide an apprenticeship recruitment service at no cost to yourself, we will work with your CPD and internal training assessment methods to support existing staff with work-based qualifications. We will also provide a full recruitment service for all apprentices primarily aimed at the 16-24 age groups. This is delivered by a team of Engagement specialists who manage the placement of apprentices. All roles will be advertised using the gov.uk apprenticeship website.

We will continue to develop our capability to act as a one-stop recruitment point to field all applicants; carrying out CV reviews, application analysis, initial assessments and first stage interviews. Recruitment staff will match successful applicants with your vacancy providing a short list of suitable applicants for you to consider.

We will arrange interviews; liaising between you, the employer, and the short listed apprentice applicants, to make certain that your decision to offer the apprenticeship opportunity is as simple and effective as possible.

The Digital Apprenticeship Service

Comprehensive support will be provided to enable you to work through the Digital Apprentice Service. We will explain how the funding and charges flow and how payments should be made. Once you have engaged your apprentice, we will continue to go beyond the basic apprenticeship contractual requirements providing a fully comprehensive service.

We will ensure that all apprenticeship requirements are planned for and delivered, with outcomes aligned with your company’s specific skill development ambitions. Furthermore, we assist you in ensuring that in-company structures and mentoring regimes are embedded.

The team will plan for your staff and apprentice’s to successfully complete the End Point Assessment (EPA), which will include a role-play/interview scenario, practical assessments and evidence collation.

Our service will continue to ensure that your recruitment and staff development is fully integrated with your wider employee and strategic business plans. With focus on delivering effective return on investments and reinforcing your company’s unique selling points.

If you wish, we would be delighted to talk about how we can provide additional specific learning to meet your company’s unique skill needs.