01

Compliance

Compliance to many in our sector means funding rules but it actually means far more: how effective are you at meeting your internal processes and procedures, or to what extent do you meet your contractual terms with your students and employers? In DfE funded world, compliance with financial handbooks is essential so our services help providers meet and exceed those obligations and manage risk of funding clawback through individual and ongoing support activities.

We can bespoke funding scrutiny activities and support with risk management through mock audits, sample or spot check based funding rule compliance reviews, preparing you for regulator assurance work and external audit through expert analysis of key systems and creating practical Compliance Improvement Plans.

We expect our clients to be demanding in their scope of work. Its easy to say what's wrong so what we like to do is support you with detailed recommendations of how to get things right fluidly, blending quality expectations with compliance to be efficient but also of the highest quality. Work with us to spend less time worrying about funding clawback but equally strengthen your processes to ensure they work for all stakeholders and not just auditors.

Many of our clients use us on an annual retainer basis, providing day to day piece of mind and swift response to compliance queries and concerns. Contact us for more information on how we could support you.

02

Quality

Supporting with continuous improvement we offer advice and guidance on Ofsted preparation, workshops and development on a range of training provider subjects including curriculum development and design of product solutions partnering with expert consultants and our ongoing partnership with SDN Mesma, sector leaders in quality. We can also support with bid writing and strategic planning.

03

Core Solutions

We've developed many provider solutions across post 16 education including our mock and pre-audit services but also outstanding individual programmes and products that have made lasting high quality impact across the sector:

Compliance Implementation Support Services - Example Template Form & Support Packages:

1) Mock “audit” and implementation support

We can carry out activities to support your compliance assurance and funding compliance scrutiny including mock audit and subject area deep dives, producing detailed Compliance Improvement Plans. Many clients also use us on an annual retainer basis for monthly compliance support sessions, ad hoc review, evidence pack templates and CPD.

2) Evidence Pack Design

Funding rule and operational compliance and contract document templates.

3) Continuous Professional Development

Working in partnership with SDN Mesma, we lead on compliance CPD programmes developing sector skills and awareness of best practice using essential insights and years of innovative solutions to generate courses and workshops with exceptional feedback. See below for more information.

4) Learning Support

Forms and templates to develop a learning support claim in Apprenticeships / ASB. It’s an area of underclaim for most providers and really shouldn’t be. We can support you with the template basics and support you with a draft system design and training day to help your delivery teams implement an effective evidence system.

5) Advisory Services

We recommend our clients work with us either on retainer or block book a given number of days and then we provide guidance as and when you need it. We offer consultancy as one-off days or multi-day activities including mock DfE audit and qualitative drill down. We can support in preparation for audit or inspection and have a fantastic track record of performance.

6) Governance, Audit & Risk Committee

Our team fulfil governance and Audit and Risk Committee roles with a number of high profile organisations within the post 16 sector, using our insights and expertise to support strong independent controls and risk awareness. Our public appointments include a position on the Compliance Advisory Board of the leading education software platform Aptem.

7) Subcontractor or acquisition compliance due diligence

Supporting subcontractor compliance our range of document templates and implementation support is designed to ensure you offer a robust selection and approval process for subcontractors. We have also supported organisations in compliance reviews ahead of potential organisation acquisition.

8) Subject Based Initial Assessment and Skills Gap Analysis

For use as a part of Information, Advice and Guidance but fundamentally to ensure Apprenticeship suitability – we have over 100 of the most common Standards in our template portfolio.

The approach has worked very well in both Ofsted and DfE assurance review, establishing an evidence base that alongside review of prior qualifications gives you an effective baseline and supporting identification of suitability as well as allow measurement of ongoing distance travelled.

04

Workshops & Webinars

We offer a number of workshop days and bespoke training activities on an ad hoc basis however we also deliver a number of regular CPD and development events in partnership with SDN Mesma and have delivered to thousands of participants across the last ten years. You can access some of the free webinars we have done here

Some of our 2025 feedback:

“Thank you so much for these sessions, they're the most useful thing I think I've ever seen!” 

“Excellent in all aspects! Really interesting online sessions, and the workbooks and other additional materials are very detailed and useful”.

 “Brilliant, really informative, clear and easy to understand”.

 “I have no feedback on improvements!  I thought it was brilliant”.

 “Very, very helpful and super clear”

 “Fabulous!”

 Click here for the latest SDN Mesma events or contact us for more information using the get in touch form below.