The West Midlands Combined Authority has a huge levy pot that they are unable to spend and they have been offering businesses in the area they cover the opportunity to use their levy to take on certain apprentices, such as digital marketers and junior content producers. In light of coronavirus, they’re now extending this opportunity to use their levy fund for all standard apprenticeships.
So what is the levy and how does the transfer work? Any company that has a payroll of over £3 million p/a will pay into a levy. The levy pot is ‘use it or lose it.’ This means that if the money is not spent after 18 months, the government will start taking money out of it. The levy is ring-fenced to be used to pay training costs. The West Midlands Combined Authority have set up ‘The WMCA Apprenticeship Levy Transfer Scheme’ which allows them to transfer their levy funds to business in their authority, allowing them to pay for training costs. These funds can be used for both upskilling staff with an apprenticeship or taking on a new apprentice.
We understand that currently there is a lot of uncertainty, but there is one thing we are sure about, this is the perfect opportunity to upskill your workforce. Whilst everyone (including ourselves) are desperately trying to run business as normal, this is not a normal situation, therefore we’re taking the opportunity to upskill our workforce whilst they’re working from home to make sure we have a strong team once we’re back to normality.
If you’re interested in upskilling your workforce at no cost to your business, or find out some more specific details on how the transfer works, get in contact via our email [email protected]
