Finance Services Covid 19 Frequently Asked Questions Version 7 01/04/2020
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Finance Services
Covid 19
Frequently Asked Questions
Version 7 – 01/04/2020
Version7 01/04/20FAQs – COVID-19 Edition
The purpose of the Covid-19 FAQ is to enable the schools finance team to provide
guidance where possible on what schools can do during these difficult times.
The FAQ will only cover areas of a financial nature and not any wider aspects.
It is highly likely that the advice will evolve as directed by the Government or as further
clarification is sought.
Currently we are seeking advice from the DfE with regards to:-
June budget plans - we are seeking if there are any flexibilities to this deadline
as the 30th June is as statutory deadline.
Universal Infant free school meals – seeking clarification on the methodology
of this grant in light of the school closure position.
Financial support for those establishments that are required to open as directed
by the Prime Minister.
If you have any specific questions in relation to Covid-19, please email
schools.finance@lewisham,gov.uk with COVID 19 Query in your subject header.
SCHOOL MEALS
Question
What is the advice to schools regarding school meals for children who are still
attending during the COVID-19 situation?
Answer
See letter below from the Estates, Management & Contracts team:-
Version7 01/04/20Fiona Gavin
Estate Management & Contracts
4th Floor Laurence House
Catford
London SE6 4RU
direct line 020 8314 2559
fiona.gavin@lewisham.gov.uk
.
date 22/03/2017
20/03/2020
Dear Colleagues
Re: School Meals
As you are all aware, schools will be open to a number of children over the coming weeks.
Chartwells have asked all catering staff to present themselves for work as usual (unless they
are self-isolating).
It is difficult to reliably predict the numbers of staff and pupils who will attend school but I hope
we will have a clearer picture on Monday.
We have asked Chartwells to be adaptable and responsive. I can now confirm that within the
Chartwells’ contract it is our intention to continue to serve lunch to those children at school
and to offer a weekly collection service (whilst social distancing guidance allows) to other
children eligible for a Free School Meal and to Reception and KS1 children who are eligible
for Pupil Premium.
This offer will be a hamper containing ingredients to make lunches for 1 child for 5 days.
Collection will need to be managed with consideration to social distancing. Please note that
the take away service will not be available at the start of the week. If there is some overlap
between this and any arrangement you have already made, do not be concerned about this.
Version7 01/04/20If you have FSM eligible children who are self-isolating or remaining at home and not able to
collect, we suggest that you consider offering a supermarket voucher of around £15 per week.
We await a DfE update on the national voucher scheme.
Please use your discretion to extend either service to other vulnerable families e.g. no
recourse to public funds, children in temporary accommodation etc.
Records will need to be kept of the recipients of hampers, vouchers and your spend. Your
catering bill be adjusted to reflect any spend.
Current advice is that families who pay for School Meals or bring packed lunches will continue
to do so.
The supermarket main websites are obviously very busy. I have been in touch with Tesco’s
corporate services and you can open an account at https://www.tescoforbusiness.com.
Although set up usually takes 2-3 days, I was set up the same day and efforts will be made to
process as quickly as possible. You will then be able to purchase e vouchers (sent
electronically on payment) and these can be printed and posted or emailed directly to families
who need them. Please use any other supermarkets you choose. I only mention Tesco as I
was able to get a response from them. I could not get a response from Sainsbury’s but go to
https://www.sainsburysbusinessdirect.co.uk.
I am asking the catering teams to offer Easter working to staff and they are working to have
sufficient to operate through the holidays.
If you are not in the Chartwells’ contact, you can discuss similar arrangements with your
caterer. If you have any queries, please let me know.
In the meantime, keep well and my details are above if you need to get in touch.
Yours sincerely
Fiona Gavin
Estates and Contracts Manager
Version7 01/04/20Question
What are the options for providing free school meal replacements?
Answer
You will have received a copy of a letter from Fiona Gavin on Friday last week. At the
time of writing schools have two options to meet this need:-
Option A - Hamper package - supported by Chartwells (or any alternative agreed with
your provider if you use a different contractor)
Option B - Vouchers to a value of £15 a week, i.e. £3 a day. The letter provides
guidance on creating an account with supermarkets such as Tesco and Sainsburys.
For schools that have a BACS system in place, your payment to the supermarket
should be paid via BACS
For those schools that do not have BACS in place (15 schools currently) or a
Procurement Card, we will contact you directly to enable electronic payments to be
made. Please note that you will only be able to make payments to the level of funding
in your account.
For audit purposes, we would encourage you to seek confirmation from the parents of
pupils who are eligible for FSM to confirm their preferences (and where appropriate
extended to those pupils with for example nil recourse to public funds)
A Hamper - as supplied by Chartwells
B Hamper - as supplied by alternative catering company
C voucher £15 a week i.e. £3 a day
D Nil response
You will recall we suggested that all schools should start keeping a log of costs arising
from Covid-19, including a spreadsheet for FSM. This has now been updated to
include specific information on FSM and also a tab for possible reduction in costs e.g.
gas/electric etc, if a school is closed. Please ensure you use version 2 of the COVID-
19 School Meals Provision Costs Tracker spreadsheet. (link to the spreadsheet below
which is on Services for Schools, but you will need to be logged in. The Tracker
spreadsheet is an attachment to yesterday’s news item entitled ‘School Meal Provision
Costs Tracker’).
http://schoolsservices.lewisham.gov.uk/
This information will be useful for final reconciliations including recharges for
Chartwells (where they are the provider) etc.
Should you require any further clarification please email
Schools.finance@lewisham.gov.uk
Version7 01/04/20Question
I’m experiencing problems accessing the Tesco website. Do you have any latest
information from Tesco regarding registering for vouchers?
Answer
Please see correspondence received from Tesco yesterday which you may find helpful if your
school has nominated Tesco Supermarket for vouchers:-
Subject: URGENT PLEASE -Schools in Lewisham
Thank you for contacting Tesco Corporate Gift Card Support. We apologise for the delayed response.
We can only accept orders from registered clients on our program. Once they have registered, they
could order below meal e-vouchers. Please note that these are fixed denominations.
• Sandwich - £2
• Meal Deal - £3
• Dine for 2 - £10
• Finest Meal Deal - £10
If the above denominations do not work for them, we also offer e-gift cards who can be used to
purchase any of our products. They can pick the denomination, which goes from £1 to £300.
Alternatively, we have physical gift cards, these have a wide range of denominations from £5 to £100.
We are conscious that they will want to organise quickly and registering online is quickest way to do it.
They need to access the following link in order to sign up for a corporate account:
https://biz.giftcards.tescoforbusiness.com/login/login/.
Due to the circumstances, as an exception, we could decrease the minimum order value, but we need
the school to contact us once they have registered, so we can change the setting on their accounts.
This will allow them to make orders less than £1000 and will decrease the minimum order value to
£100.
We accept BACs, CHAPs, credit card and cheque as form of payment. As we know they want the
orders to be received as soon as possible, we suggest using CHAPs or credit card. Additionally,
please be advised that we do send an invoice after the order is placed.
Regarding your worries about our website, we were under maintenance update yesterday and the
tech difficulties have been sorted out.
Should you have any further queries, please let me know.
Best regards,
Miguel S.
Customer Service Supervisor
Tesco Corporate Gift Card Support
Version7 01/04/20Question
Are there any GDPR implications to consider with FSM and BACS payments to
parents/guardians?
Answer
Potentially yes. For schools choosing to make payments to “parents/guardians bank
accounts directly”, in addition to ensuring you have sought written permission to do
so, please also ensure that you are compliant with any GDPR regulations.
You also need to ensure that you have satisfied yourself that the bank details provided
are correct and are in the name of the nominated parent or guardian. We would
suggest you obtain a copy of the top part of the bank statement which will include
name, address and bank details. This should be cross referenced with the details on
the form completed and signed by the parent/guardian.
We would further suggest that the bank statement is not older than 2 months and is in
the name of who the school considers to be the parent/guardian.
Please further ensure that such data is not kept or stored in any compromising places
such as personal laptops, but instead accessed via secure access.
EXCEPTIONAL COSTS (updated 01/04/20)
Question
It is possible that COVID -19 will result in additional cost? Who will bear this cost?
Answer
At present the Government has made some high level announcements (and the advice
continues to evolve). Some of these could potentially result in additional costs.
Equally, possible reduced costs for example gas/electric for schools if closed for a
period.
We have provided a spreadsheet which you should keep updated so that for various
reasons, the cost of the COVID-19 (or in some cases underspend) can be captured.
We have also amended the budget plan templates and designated one of the “spare”
columns to include increased cost or reduction as a result of COVID-19. It will be
important that this information is captured so that it doesn’t distort your 3 year budget
planning.
Version7 01/04/20Question
What can I do if my school is facing potential loss of income due to COVID-19, e.g.
cancelled lettings, reduced donations etc?
Answer
Schools finance want to understand the impact of such loss in income. We have
produced a spreadsheet which you must complete to capture this detail, and email to
us. Please download the spreadsheet from SLA Online (you will need to sign in to
access it).
http://schoolsservices.lewisham.gov.uk/
Question
Should I continue to pay agency staff? And will the government pay towards this cost?
Answer
This is a decision for the school, however it would seem reasonable that if you have
had a member of staff working with you for some time e.g. one month plus, and if all
things being equal you would have continued to employ them, then you retain them.
This is clearly different to having had a one day cover for sickness etc.
It would be unlikely that this cost would be covered as this was part of your planned
spending.
However if you have had unprecedented sickness arising from COVID-19 and need
to provide cover (especially for schools that are required to remain open by the
Government), we would suggest you capture this cost in the spreadsheet just in case
there is any possibility to recover costs.
BREAKFAST AND AFTERSCHOOL CLUBS (added 26/3/20)
Question
Do we continue to charge for breakfast clubs or can this cost be met centrally?
Answer
If the service is being provided as part of the normal school day then this needs to
continue to be charged as previous.
Version7 01/04/20ADDITIONAL OPENING TIMES (added 26/03/2020)
Question
Will the LA support additional opening times e.g. Easter?
Answer
Only where there is a clear instruction from the Director of Education or the
Executive Director of Children’s and Young Peoples Services.
Schools will be reimbursed for any additional direct costs arising from the extended
openings. Schools will be required to provide supporting documentation in support
of such claims.
DELAYS TO RESTRUCTURES (added 26/03/2020)
Question
In light of Covid-19 some schools are considering the deferral of planned
restructures. The question being if the delay would be supported financially?
Answer
There may be a possible claim for it being indirectly related, but at this stage this
cannot be guaranteed. Please include this possible capture in the Covid-19 claims
spreadsheet.
FRAUD & COVID-19 (added 30/03/2020)
Question
I hear that unfortunately this situation can provide an opportunity for fraudsters. What
measures can schools put into place to avoid/mitigate the impact of fraud?
Answer
Please see the article published today to Services for Schools, entitled ‘Fraud Control
in Emergency Management – COVID-19’ which gives the government guidance. You
will need to be logged in to view.
http://schoolsservices.lewisham.gov.uk/
Version7 01/04/20CLOSING OF ACCOUNTS
Question
We have had concerns on the practicality of the closing of our school accounts and
meeting the deadlines. Are the deadlines likely to change?
Answer
As schools can appreciate the position may change, but at present Lewisham finance
advice suggests the following:-
Schools should do what they can to provide the information in a timely manner.
Closure of accounts is a statutory requirement as is the return of key information such
as VAT.
However we are mindful of the challenges both at school level and LA level.
Hopefully most schools should have completed closure as instructed for January and
February and as such schools are in a much better place than they would have been.
Schools should really only have to finalise March and at worst an estimate for March
- mainly payroll data. Anything else will need to be carried forward expenditure and
will therefore hit your accounts in the following year but this will be recognised, as you
will have your surplus. This can be defined clearly in your monitoring reports as there
is a column for prior year income and expenditure.
Our backup position will be to assist if possible remotely, for schools that have given
us access to their finance systems. I.e. for Vat etc. A request was made for schools to
give us remote access. If it’s minor, then we can do it, however if we come across
issues like your accounts being un-reconcilable then we will need to agree a fee. That
would be discussed with the Head.
Clearly we have to be mindful that schools finance only have a small team so practical
solutions need to be in place. Within the closure of accounts timeline there are some
things we cannot help with like schools that do not buy our payroll service or payroll
returns; these are an essential part of closing the accounts and auditors require them.
BUDGET SETTING
Question
With board meetings being cancelled for the foreseeable future, we have had concerns
from Governing Bodies regarding their budget setting. We also have had concerns on
the practicality of agreeing budgets etc, remotely (e.g. via Skype).
Version7 01/04/20Are the deadlines likely to change?
Answer
The 30th June is a DfE deadline. We have contacted the DfE to assess if there is any
flexibility to the deadline and await feedback. Until then, governing bodies must aim
to meet this deadline.
All things being equal, schools should have been working on three year rolling budgets
and should meet this deadline. Schools should be able to produce this information
remotely.
We will offer ongoing support but clearly, remotely.
I think schools should be in a position to deliver budgets to governors for agreement,
remotely via email etc.
Please note, we have updated the budget plan template to now include a column for
COVID 19, so that this cost/saving is identified separately.
These are extraordinary times and we need to continue business continuity, but as
practically and safely as possible.
If a school is facing real difficulties they need to contact their link finance officer
urgently.
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