BUFDG Digest 27 August

BUFDG  

This is the last Digest before we wave goodbye to our longest-serving colleague. After almost a quarter of a century assisting BUFDG members and staff with events, Gill has decided to hang up her lanyard on 5 September and, as one member so accurately noted, it's hard to imagine BUFDG without her. It’s not too late to send your best wishes via Amanda, Many have shared memories and comments in recent weeks, describing Gill as professional, kind, helpful, supportive and superhuman. We couldn’t agree more - the BUFDG team and Professional HE Services colleagues will miss her very much. This sad day does mean we will be welcoming new faces to the team in the coming weeks, and we look forward to introducing you. The whole team will be pitching in to ensure member events run smoothly in the meantime.   

We are underway with planning group meetings, round table discussions and Time to Talks on a range of topics for 2025/26, and the BUFDG events page is filling fast. If you have any suggestions that you would like us to consider let us know by replying to this email, or contacting one of the team.  

UPCOMING EVENTS  

As the implementation of the Lifelong Learning Entitlements (LLE), some providers have reported receipt of an invitation from the DfE to submit an expression of interest listing courses from which they intend to offer modules to be funded under LLE from January 2027. We've arranged for the Student Loans Company to present a Time to Talk session on the latest LLE developments at 3-4pm on Monday 8 September. The session is open to all BUFDG and HESPA members. BUFDG members can book your place here, and follow this discussion thread for latest updates.

A reminder for the next Time to Talk Financial Planning and Analysis on Tuesday 9 September, 10-11am,, providing an opportunity to share experiences and insight with finance and planning members across other Higher Education Providers.

BUFDG and UHR are hosting a joint webinar with the University of Southampton, on Tuesday 14 October at 10am. The session will look at the story of how they’ve delivered efficiencies and savings through use of a managed service approach for their recruitment and agency staffing needs, alongside Tate recruitment. This webinar is tailored for professionals within the BUFDG and UHR communities, focusing on the intersection of finance technology, HR, procurement, and strategic planning.  

Bookings are open for Management Accountants' Week 2025, with webinars across a range of topics scheduled 18-21 November. The full programme will be announced soon. A 20% discount is available for additional tickets for staff at the same provider. 

SECTOR  

The last edition of the Digest was published on the eve of A-Levels day, with students across England, Wales, and Northern Ireland waking up to results on 14 August. Department for Education stats show that a university education remains a popular pathway for young people, with a record 193,510 English 18-year-olds securing a place at their first-choice institution—up from 184,400 in 2024. The strong demand was welcomed by Million Plus and the Russell Group.  

There’s also been a rise in the number of international students accepted to UK institutions through UCAS, and although there has been a decrease in sponsored study visa grants over the last 2 years, the July visa application data showed some signs of some stabilisation. Wonkhe gets to grips with the data, and reminds us there are icebergs ahead!  

The Office for Students (OfS) has confirmed new conditions will apply to any applications for registration received ahead of OfS register reopening on or after 28 August 2025. 

A King’s Policy Institute/HEPI report on research that examined the public’s understanding and views of UK higher education has been published, finding a range of misconceptions and some good news, including that “Graduates are far more positive about their experience at university than people think, and feel far less burdened by the debt than many assume.” 

A recent Times Education Commission report proposed a twelve-point plan for education including a 15-year strategy, fifty new university campuses in H E ‘cold spots’, and a transferrable credit system between universities and colleges to boost productivity and enable “universities working with further education (...) to take higher education out to new places.” 

 
SCOTLAND 

The Scottish Funding Council (SFC) has released its first Self-Evaluation and Action Plan (SEAP) Thematic Report, based on submissions from December 2024. The report identifies sector-wide good practice and areas for improvement, aligned with Scotland’s Tertiary Quality Enhancement Framework. The next SEAP submissions are due in December 2025, refreshed guidance can be found in Annex B of the SFC Guidance on Quality for Colleges and Universities for 2024-25 to 2030-31. 

The SFC has announced a change to institutional fair access targets for the 2026-27 academic year. The requirement that students from the 20% most deprived backgrounds should represent at least 10% of full-time first degree entrants will be replaced with a commitment from each Scottish HEP to increase the proportion of 'SIMD (Scottish Index of Multiple Deprivation) 20' entrants or to match the highest proportion they have achieved since 2013-14.  

BBC Scotland and other regional press outlets reported that the SFC has rejected a recently submitted recovery plan for Dundee University, and proposed an alternative proposition which will now be considered by the University’s court.  

Fellow PHES association AUDE has published a Scottish supplement to the Estates Management Record (EMR), a data collection by HESA used for benchmarking and trend analysis in estates income, expenditure, and condition. The new AUDE publication, titled ‘Comparative Analysis of Estates Data for HEIs in Scotland against the rest of the UK’ (AUDE login required) uses 2022-23 EMR Data to highlight interesting and useful comparisons between the Scottish H E estate and the wider UK estate.  

WALES  

Medr has published 2025-26 allocations of the Wales Research Environment and Culture (WREC) fund, which provides funding to Welsh universities to support projects, programmes and activities that actively contribute to supporting or developing positive and healthy research cultures and environments.  
 

TAX AND PAYROLL 

Please note that we have revised and reissued our Terminations Payments guidance to include important corrections on enhanced redundancy and the Alternative Calculation PENP method. The revised guidance is now available here. 

BUFDG has been asked to facilitate closed member meetings for HEPs considering or in the process of setting up TNE programmes. If you would like to be involved, please email Julia including details on the programmes you are considering/establishing, and any suggestions on how you would like these meetings to run.  

A Time to Talk - EY India - Tax Update has been scheduled for 16 September, 10-11.30am (via Teams). This session will cover Indian Tax & Regulatory topics impacting UK universities, including evolving regulatory landscape in India around branch campuses and partnerships, tax and GST implications for recruitment and online learning, and insights into the Indian tax litigation process, including audits, assessments, and strategies for achieving certainty.  

PROCUREMENT  

HEPA is pleased to invite Heads of Procurement from HEPs which are not contacting authorities to join a new ‘Non-contracting authority’ group which will facilitate discussions focused on the benefits and challenges that are faced by those with such a status. The first meeting will take place on Tuesday 23 September 2025, 1:30-3pm via Teams. Find out more and book your place here.  

Details have been announced for upcoming HEPA and EAUC Responsible Procurement Group events in September, October and November 2025, including a Responsible Procurement In-Person Workshop in Edinburgh (17 September) and Responsible Procurement Group Circular Economy Discussion Groups in October and December. Registration and further information can be found here.  
 
A new monthly digital update has been launched by the Jisc Procurement and Supplier Management team, designed specifically for procurement professionals across H E and F E institutions to receive key updates on sector-wide digital technology procurement frameworks and dynamic markets, insights into Jisc-negotiated content and software agreements which meet the needs of the sector, and news on upcoming events, webinars and opportunities to collaborate. Sign up here to be part of the conversation. 

COUNTER FRAUD 

Barclays are running a webinar focused on managing financial crime risks in H E which is taking place on 18 September 2025 from 11am-midday. Speakers will share insights on current financial crime trends, including fraud and cybersecurity threats that may impact your HEP both now and in the future. They will also offer practical advice on how to effectively manage these risks. Members can register for their place on the Barclays website here. 

UKUPC have produced a really useful fraud alert for suppliers, which you can download here to share with your supply chain. The alert outlines details of a known fraud impacting suppliers to the sector, and offers some great tips to assist in identifying fraudulent emails and purchase orders. 

FINANCIAL REPORTING 

The FEHE SORP has been approved in principle by the Financial Reporting Council (FRC) and is now expected to be published in September, once the International Financial Reporting Standards Foundation (IFRS) license has been approved.  

Those working on the implementation of the new SORP, which is effective from 1 January 2026, can book onto the next FEHE SORP Implementation Forum taking place online Tuesday 9 September, 1-3pm. Following discussions at the last meeting of the FEHE SORP Implementation Forum, we have an offer from the University of Oxford to share their progress so far with implementing lease software for SORP, in this case FinQuery. If anyone else would like to volunteer to share on alternative software options at the next Forum, please let Joni know.  

The FRC has published a discussion paper and launched the next phase of engagement on its Future of Audit Supervision Strategy (FASS), which aims to evolve its supervisory approach to support an environment that promotes a resilient audit market and enables firms of all sizes to deliver high-quality while driving accountability, and improvement. 
 

TRAC 

New 2024-25 TRAC guidance has been published for those involved in the preparation, compilation, validation and approval of TRAC data. A useful ‘explainer’ document has also been produced to help institutions communicate with academics and other colleagues including the principles of collecting time data, how the data is used in the TRAC return, and the relationship between TRAC and income received by the institution. 

A reminder that the next TRAC Practitioners Conference takes place on the 23-24 September. As part of the conference package we will once again hold a standalone ‘TRAC for Beginners’ session on the 16 September. 

 
RESEARCH AND INNOVATION  

A provisional date of Wednesday 15 October, 1.30-3pm, has been scheduled for the next Research Finance Forum, pending confirmation of Chair and guest speaker availability. We will confirm this date and booking information as soon as possible, and encourage you to hold this time in your calendar in the meantime.  

During 2024-25 we trialled two BUFDG Research Finance Forum Teams channels as a space for BUFDG members to interact with each other and share news and resources between Research Finance Forum meetings. This was as an alternative and more instant option to our research discussion board, which continued as usual. Now the trial period is up, we'd be grateful for input on whether this additional communication channel is useful and should continue long-term. You can find a short survey here, which will close on Monday 15 September 2025. We will review responses and engagement to inform what happens next. If you have not already joined on Teams but would like to, you can still complete the survey and let us know and we will add you if/when the continuation of the channels is confirmed. 

SUSTAINABILITY / ESTATES 

AUDE has launched an updated version of the Capital Cost Database (AUDE login required), an online repository of cost data from completed capital projects in the higher education sector that may prove useful if your institution is planning a new build or refurbishment capital project.  

PENSIONS  

USS has published the 2025 FRS 102 i-letter, which reflects the latest available information in respect of the funding position of USS, for use in financial statements. It is accompanied by the 'Annex A' Sep 25 disclosure note. In December 2024, USS issued a correction to the 2024 letter re. CPI assumptions. Following these issues, USS undertook a full review of the controls on the i-letter production and identified minor updates to the 2024 disclosures - changing the comparative mortality figures by 0.2 years each. Auditors have confirmed this is not material and doesn’t require any specific restatement disclosure. 

JOB OF THE FORTNIGHT 

Our featured role is Financial Planning Accountant at the University of Southampton, an opening for a qualified accountant to handle essential statutory reporting requirements including Transparent Approach to Costing (TRAC) and Office for Students (OfS) returns, and provide management information on financial performance. The closing date is 14 September.  Find more H E finance roles on the BUFDG website here.