Finance finds out last
Some of your employers pay a share of the apprenticeship cost directly, depending on their size and the rules at the time the learner started. What each employer owes, and when, depends on the learner's start date, the agreed price and your payment schedule. All of that lives in your MIS and the employer agreement.
Invoices are raised in Xero or Sage by your finance team, who work from a spreadsheet the delivery team updates. When a learner starts late, withdraws or changes employer, the spreadsheet is updated when someone remembers. Some invoices go out late. Some go out for learners who already left. A few are never raised at all, and the gap is noticed at year end.
Why the invoices and the learners drift apart
- Learner data and invoicing live in different systems, joined by a spreadsheet.
- Changes to starts, withdrawals and employers reach finance by email, if at all.
- Each employer agreement can set a different schedule, and the schedule is read by hand.
- Small employers often want one invoice covering several apprentices, which means combining lines by hand.
- Nobody reconciles invoices raised against learners active, except occasionally.
What it costs to get this wrong
Missed invoices are income you are owed and never collect. Late invoices annoy employers, who have budgeted for one date and receive a bill for three months at once. Invoices for learners who have left lead to credit notes and awkward calls. And finance time goes on rebuilding the spreadsheet each month rather than chasing payment.
What you charge and when is set by your agreements and the rules you follow, and we do not advise on them. We take the amounts and schedule you define and make sure invoicing follows the learner records.
How we connect learners to invoices
- We read learner, employer and status data from your MIS, through its API or a scheduled export.
- Each employer's invoicing terms are recorded once: amount basis, schedule, whether to combine apprentices, purchase order needs and billing contact.
- Each month the system drafts the invoices due, one line per apprentice, grouped as the employer prefers.
- Changes since last month are highlighted: new starts, withdrawals, changes of employer and paused learners, so finance can see why a draft looks different.
- Finance reviews and approves the batch, and the invoices are created in Xero or Sage through their APIs, with the learner reference on each line.
- Payments are matched back from the accounts package, and overdue ones appear in a list for the account manager as well as finance.
| Event in the MIS | Effect on invoicing | Who checks |
|---|---|---|
| New start | Added to the next draft from the start date | Finance |
| Withdrawal | Future invoices stopped, flagged for review | Finance and delivery manager |
| Change of employer | Schedule moved to the new employer after review | Finance |
| Break in learning | Held according to your terms | Finance |
| Completion | Final invoice drafted if due | Finance |
Month end for finance, afterwards
On the first working day of the month, your finance officer opens a batch of draft invoices with a short list of changes. Two new starts, one withdrawal. They check the withdrawal with the delivery manager, approve the batch, and the invoices are in Xero in minutes.
Employers get one clear invoice with each apprentice named. Business development managers can see if an employer is behind on payment before they visit. At year end, invoices raised match learners active, because they come from the same data.
Does finance chase delivery for this information?
- Contribution invoices are raised from a spreadsheet updated by hand.
- Invoices have gone out for apprentices who had already left.
- Some invoices are found missing at year end.
- Employers receive several months of invoices at once.
- Finance and delivery disagree about who is currently in learning.