Any group or organisation accessing funding needs to have sound financial (and other) decision-making processes and to have financial controls in place covered by a policy, and procedure. This protects members and any funding and demonstrates that the group or organisation is capable of holding money safely.
The forum will need to consider:
- Writing a financial control policy that meets the needs of the forum now and safeguards its current funding and personnel. Build into this a review process so that the policy can evolve as the forum grows.
- Setting a realistic and sensible budget that it keeps under regular review. If the forum only has the DfE funding, this will reflect the budget headings in the forum’s approved grant application.
- What methods or software the forum uses to keep financial records accurately, securely, and up to date.
Any potential funders (including the DfE) will seek assurances that forums have adequate financial controls in place before approving any funding. For example, the DfE grant requires the submission of a financial control policy. This is checked to see if it is adequate, when it was last updated, and if it has been ratified (signed and approved), before the grant is approved.
Much of the information in this section will also apply to other money or funding that the forum holds. However, different funders may have different conditions or requirements the forum will need to be aware of and work to.
All parent care forums must have a financial control policy to comply with the terms of the DFE grant. The forums financial control policy is a set of guiding principles or rules that the forum uses to set its direction. It also follows the policy to manage its:
- Assets, resources and funds effectively.
- Protect assets from fraud, theft or misuse.
- Protect its people.
- Make sound decisions.
- Report and comply with any funders’ requirements; and operate within the law.
There is an example financial control policy on the page policies and procedures. New forums and existing forums may want to use and amend this to suit the forum’s needs.
A financial control procedure narrows down what is in the policy. It explains step by step how organisations will carry out what is in their policy, what actions to take, and by whom.
Having effective financial controls enables organisations to:
- Have clear guidelines for all volunteers and staff.
- Have a clear decision-making process around spending and managing risks.
- Have a consistent, standard approach e.g. to approving expense claims.
- Designate/restrict access to financial resources.
- Manage its money, assets, and resources effectively.
- Maintain accurate financial records.
- Protect its assets and people (volunteers and staff).
- Be responsible and accountable.
- Prevent fraud.
- Be transparent and honest.
- Create a safe and trusting environment where everyone knows what is expected of them.
Video: Why do forums need a financial control policy?
Financial management a shared responsibility
The responsibilities and liabilities of individuals within a forum may vary depending on the forum’s legal structure. Everyone needs to be clear what these are when deciding upon the right structure for the forum. However, no one person is responsible for the forum’s money. There is a collective responsibility, and there needs to be a clear line of responsibility for reporting any breaches to the forum’s financial control policy or procedure, along with the actions that need to be taken.
Individuals should not have the power to spend the DFE participation grant without the knowledge of others. Grant funding should be kept in a bank account that requires more than one signature. Forums with any family member groups will need procedures in place to ensure that they do not authorise each other’s expenses or authorise payments to each other. No individual within the forum should make a payment to themselves.
Any designated authority to approve payments should align with the set amounts agreed in your forum’s procedure. Decisions to purchase high value goods or services should always be made to ensure value for money is obtained, should be collective, and have a clear audit trail of the decision. This helps to minimise any risks when making purchases.
The accounts and bank statements should be filed and be available to any steering group member or funder to view on request. It is good practice to provide all steering group members with copies of the finance reports, and for finance to feature as a standing Steering Group (or governance meeting) agenda item.
Selecting a Treasurer or Finance Manager
One of the first things to do is to decide who will take overall responsibility for managing the forum’s finances, and what powers or controls they have. This person is sometimes called the Treasure or Finance manager, depending on the forums chosen legal structure.
There might be a member of the forum who has prior financial experience or expertise, or there may be someone who is willing to train up. You will need to choose carefully and ensure that their appointment follows the process set out in your constitution. If there is nobody with the knowledge or experience required, the forum can buy in support from an accountant or bookkeeper. They will need to be aware of the conditions of the DfE grant when reporting the forums spend.
The Treasurer or Finance Manager may take responsibility for monitoring money going in and out of the forum’s bank account, maintaining the books or accounts, and keeping the financial records.
The Treasurer or Finance Manager works with other members of the steering group to set the forum’s annual budget. (Your DfE grant and any other funding may dictate this). The treasurer will be responsible for compiling reports at agreed intervals to the steering group to show current spend against each budget heading, as well as providing details of any income and bank balance/s. The forum will need to decide on the frequency of the reports on the financial position, so you can adjust budgets if necessary. This will enable forums to account for any surplus or overspend in particular categories or take action to prevent overall overspending. Spend will also need to be monitored, as grant funding often requires any underspend to be returned to the funder. They may also need to compile an end of year report to be presented at the Annual General meeting.
The treasurer or finance manager will keep an eye on the forum’s set budget to ensure that the forum is on track to spend their funds in the way that they agreed at the start of the financial year.
The treasurer’s records need to be kept up to date so that if they are ill, on holiday or leave the forum, someone else can take over the role and know where everything is stored.
There are various resources available to support the treasurer in their role. If the forum’s treasurer would like support from the grants team contact your Contact adviser.
Video: The role of a treasurer
Setting a budget
It helps to have a budget in place from the start of the financial year or funding period. The parent carers with forum oversight, normally the forum steering group, will need to have agreed a budget to enable them to apply for the participation. You will need to include details of categories of spend as part of the application.
Without an agreed plan, the forum risks:
- Spending its money too soon in the year, leaving too little for the later months.
- Spending money on the wrong things.
- Not being able to cover obligations such as rent, parent’s expenses, staffing, or insurance.
- Overspending or overcommitting funds.
The simplest budgeting can be done by putting expenditure under headings, for example:
- Events such as conferences, catering, coffee mornings, focus groups on specific topics, launch event, presence at information events.
- Publicity or marketing such as forum flyers, logo, website design and license.
- Training for the steering group or wider forum e.g. Parent Representative training, co-production, SEND law, working as a team, roles and responsibilities of the steering group, role of the chair or co-chairs.
- Parent Carer Expenses such as travel, childcare and subsistence.
- Parent carer remuneration for attending strategic meetings
- Staffing e.g. for a coordinator, administrator, or social media moderator
- Infrastructure such as rent, meeting room hire, stationery, phone contract, Zoom account, SurveyMonkey, IT equipment and software, insurance, licenses
If the forum receives funding in addition to the DFE participation grant, they may use multiple sources to fund one thing. When a forum does this, they need to clearly record this. For example, staffing 50% may come from the DFE grant and 50% may come from local authority funding.
The treasurer will keep the budget under review by tracking that spending is in line with the original planned budget. It makes sense to do this regularly through reports to the steering group or committee. By having a clear budget, the forum will always know where its spending is up to against planned activity. The forum can then make any adjustments required through the year.
We run a grants online learning session each year to update forums on any changes to the grants paperwork and guidance. You can also watch this online learning session on Using your DfE grant.
Top tip
forums may want to schedule steering groups dates to allow for a new annual budget to be set in March each year, ahead of the grant application. You will also need to agree a process to sign off the grant monitoring, before it is submitted each year.
Keeping your financial management updated
Policies and procedures will develop over time. Forums need to keep them under regular review to ensure that they still cover the forum’s core activities. They may need to be revised as the forum matures, secures additional funding, or employs staff or workers.
All forums that are successful in the grant application will receive information to help forums to manage their DfE grants and day to day finances. This includes what information and records the forum needs to keep, helping to prepare for the annual grant monitoring process. The Managing your Grant document, which is updated each year, should be reviewed regularly to ensure forum practice aligns with the grant requirements.
Support for forums
Forums can find a list of support available below and in the Support for forums section of the handbook. Contact’s grant team are available to support forums with questions around their financial control and governance. Forums can speak to their Contact adviser for more information.
- NCVO: Guidance, techniques and tools for managing your organisation’s finances
- Charity Commission: Managing Charity finances
- Community Interest Company: Guidance
Do you have any thoughts about this page? Visit our How to feedback page to share them.
Looking for something else? You can find a full list of pages on our Parent Carer forum handbook contents page.
More support for forums
Community Matters Yorkshire
Community Matters provides support to forums especially around policies and procedures.
Community Matters Yorkshire
Contact adviser
Find out more about your named Contact adviser
Contact Parent Carer Participation Advisers
DfE grants and monitoring
Find out more about the Department for Education (DfE) grant for forums
Grants and monitoring
CIC wellbeing assistance program
Find out more about support from CIC wellbeing
CIC Assistance Programme
Support for forums
Find out about the support available for forums
Support for forums
Using your DfE grant
Click here to watch this video on our YouTube page
Find out more