The guidance and requirements in the college accounts direction do not apply to specialist further education (FE) colleges funded by the Department for Education (DfE) as ‘Special post 16 institutions’ (SPIs), which are often described as FE colleges.
College accounts direction for 2025 to 2026
The college accounts direction for the year 2025 to 2026 sets out DfE’s financial reporting requirements for:
- further education colleges
- sixth form colleges
- institutions established or designated under the provisions of the Further and Higher Education Act 1992 (designated institutions)
The updates made to the college accounts direction since last year are captured at the beginning of this new edition.
The accounts direction outlines the requirements for each college to:
- prepare audited accounts to 31 July 2026
- submit accounts and associated documents to DfE by December 31, 2026
- publish accounts on the college’s website as soon as possible after signing but no later than 31 January 2027
You must refer to the college accounts direction 2025 to 2026 when preparing your accounts.
If you have concerns about meeting the 31 December submission deadline, you should contact your DfE place-based team contact as soon as possible and prior to the submission deadline.
You, rather than your auditors, will need to submit all required documents by following the submission process below.
Finance Record for 2024 to 2025
Complete the Finance Record for 2024 to 2025 and submit it with your audited annual report and accounts for the college financial year 2024 to 2025.
The ‘Finance record for 2024 to 2025’ is not accessible because of missing alternative text, hard to read text contrast and the use of merged cells. This means it does not meet web content accessibility guidelines success criteria criterion 1.1.1 non-text content, 1.3.1 info and relationships and 1.4.3 contrast. Our teams are working to fix this or provide an alternative which should be available by 30 November 2026.
Submitting your documents
Your financial statements for 2025 to 2026 and associated documents must be submitted through the College financial data (CFD) service. This requires a DfE Sign-in account.
Once you have logged in you will be able to upload your documents by clicking on ‘start’ and choosing:
- ‘Annual financial statements return’
- the year the submission is being made for
The mandatory elements must initially be uploaded at the same time, but can be resubmitted separately, if required. These are:
- audited annual report and financial statements
- external auditor’s audit findings report
- finance record
- audit committee annual report
- non-dormant subsidiary financial statements (if required)
There is also an option to upload additional supporting documentation if applicable. You will receive email confirmation that your upload has been successful.
Further details are available within the submission portal. If the person responsible for submitting these documents does not have access to DfE Sign-in they should follow the instructions to Create a DfE Sign-in account.
If you have any questions about your submission, contact us using the Customer Help Portal.
Regularity self-assessment questionnaire
The regularity self-assessment questionnaire must be completed by:
- further education colleges
- sixth-form colleges
- designated institutions
It must be signed by the:
- accounting officer
- chair of governors
The questionnaire must be shared with the college’s external auditor to help inform the regularity assurance engagement.
Further guidance or requirements may be issued as required by DfE.
