CRF: Information for applicants offered funding

Updates 

• FAQs on Subsidy Control (section 6) added 26/05/2021
• FAQs on Certified Income & Expenditure (section 4) added 04/06/2021
• FAQs on Diversity Milestone Plans (section 5) added 09/06/2021 
• FAQs on Activity Report Forms and Final Payment requests (section 3) added 22/07/2021
• FAQ on ‘pay restraint’ condition added to section 3 on 15/07/2021
  
   

I have received a reduced offer; can I find out why?

DCMS instructed us to make reductions of ineligible and non-essential costs to ensure that we could support as many organisations as possible.

The factors that we considered when applying reductions to awards include:

• removing ineligible costs including, for example, depreciation, requests for capital that were over 10% of the request (or 20% if a listed building), funding reserves over eight weeks’ turnover
• removing costs which were viewed to be non-essential for re-opening or to fall within the funding period 
• applying for more than 50% of a CRF1 award and/or 25% of turnover without exceptional reasons 

Due to the high volume of reductions in this round we have not been able to provide tailored reasons for reductions as part of offer letters.

Our application included funding for activity that is now not deliverable due to changes in Coronavirus guidance, local lockdowns or other changes to circumstance - what should we do?

We are aware that the plans you submitted in January may have had to change in response to the guidance set out in the Governments step-by-step plan to ease restrictions in England and/or you may need to rethink how you will deliver these plans in light of a reduced award. 

We want to reassure you that we understand these challenges and the need for plans to be flexed accordingly.

We can therefore allow for flexibility in the delivery of plans as set out in your original application and you do not need to contact us about changes as long as your plans remain in line with CRF2 eligible costs and within the aims of the scheme.   

We hope that the four steps outlined in the government’s plan to ease restrictions will take place in line with the published “no earlier than” dates, and therefore you may be able to deliver activity within the April - June period as planned. However, if the steps are significantly delayed, we will write to update you on any further flexibility within the permitted use of your CRF2 funds, including any scope to deliver activity outside of the funding period.

I have furloughed staff, what does this mean for my grant?

The Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme has been extended until 30 September 2021 and we know some of you will intend to continue to furlough staff whilst the restrictions are lifted, and trading begins to return to normal levels. However please note that it is not permissible to receive both CRF: Grant funding and CJRS funding to cover the same staffing costs. Therefore, where staffing costs have been included in your application, these awarded funds are not eligible to be repurposed.  

If you subsequently decide to claim funding from CJRS to furlough some or all of your staff, and had originally intended to meet those costs through your CRF grant, then you will need to tell us immediately and we will reduce your CRF award.  

Please see HMRC guidance for further information

Updates 

• FAQ on ‘pay restraint’ condition added 15/07/2021

What do I need to do in terms of monitoring and/or reporting on my grant? 

There are two main conditions you must meet to receive your final grant payment:  

• a completed Activity Report Form; and 
• a Certified Income and Expenditure (I&E) statement for the activity submitted as part of your final payment request step. 

Both need to be completed/submitted within Grantium.

You may have other bespoke conditions that were set specifically for your organisation, which you must provide details on before we can release your final payment. For instance, submitting an updated Diversity Milestone Plan. You will be able to see what these are (if you have any) in your Offer Letter and/or your final Payment Request submission step on Grantium. 

To receive your final payment, you must submit: 

• your final Activity Report Form 
• your final Payment Request 
• any attachments that we have requested from you (as part of your Payment Request) 

Guidance on how to submit these in Grantium can be found here.  

There is more information about we expect you to report on and what rules to follow in the Terms and Conditions of your Culture Recovery Fund grant here. 

If we need further clarification from you after you have submitted via Grantium, you will receive an email notification outlining what it is that you need to do. 

Can I send you this information directly/via email? 

Unfortunately, we cannot accept and review this information unless it has been submitted via our online grant making system – Grantium. This is for auditing purposes and so that a trained staff member can review the information you provide. 

You will need to supply the necessary information and submit your payment request within Grantium for us to release your final payment to you. 

What specific information do I have to provide in my activity report form? 

The Activity Report form must be filled out within Grantium and includes the following evaluation questions: 

Tell us how you spent the funds, and what difference this emergency grant has made to your organisation 

The is also where we’ll ask you to record and explain any changes to your plan. We understand that changes in restrictions may mean you have had to use your grant in different ways than originally outlined in our application – this is fine, as long as you have used it on eligible costs under the aims of the fund.

You will then have to respond to the following question :

Please also tell us what actions you have taken and plan to take to meet the following conditions set by the Treasury (as outlined in the Guidance for Applicants and Terms and Conditions of your grant): 

• the organisation will exercise pay restraint for at least 18 months from the date of the funding agreement, where legally possible for them to do so, including imposing a pay freeze for all senior staff (ie. those contracted to receive above £100,000 per year) and 10% pay reductions to pre-Covid-19 pay for those contracted to receive above £150,000 per year 
• the organisation will demonstrate a commitment to increase its organisational diversity and the diversity of its audiences, visitors and/or participants 
• the organisation will demonstrate a commitment to progress towards net zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050 and reporting against it 
• the organisation will demonstrate a commitment to increase educational/outreach work 
• the organisation will comply with legislation relating to State Aid (and/or Subsidy Control, the new regime that came into effect on 1 January 2021) 
• the organisation will ensure they take reasonable steps to protect the heritage assets they are responsible for, in particular their physical estates 

For monitoring purposes, you must respond to all of the conditions – for instance, if you aren’t responsible for any heritage assets, you must still respond to this condition and should state why it is not relevant for your organisation.  

In the Activity Report Form, you must also complete an Income and Expenditure table for your activity – using the table that is provided within the online report.  

The first column on the page will show the expenditure that you estimated in your application. You will then use a second column to show the actual figures for your activity. You will also enter your actual income in this section. Please enter full pounds only and check your figures carefully. Actual amounts must be provided so we can understand your full, final expenditure. 

If there are differences between your actual and estimated figures, you should explain these in the box titled ‘finance narrative’. You should also use this section to tell us if you have received support from the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme and how this has been used. 

This is also where you’ll be able to tell us if you made more income than you expected. There may be several reasons for this:  

• you made more money than you expected via ticket sales and/or sale of work 
• you received additional funding from other sources (ie. a grant from your local council) 
• some of your expenditure was lower than you expected – for example, you may have negotiated a good deal on goods or some work may have been completed faster than expected  
• you have not delivered all of the activity you expected to  

For CRF2 grant recipients, you must also fill in a ‘delivery timeline’ table, where you should update and add information on when you delivered elements of the activity.  

What do you mean by ‘pay restraint’ and how do I evidence commitment to exercising it?

In accepting your Culture Recovery Fund award, you agreed to exercise pay restraint for at least 18 months from the date of the funding agreement. Please note, as outlined guidance to Culture Recovery Fund programmes, Local Authorities and Universities are exempt from applying the pay restraint condition.

This condition includes a pay freeze for senior staff (those earning over £100,000) and 10% pay reduction to pre-Covid-19 pay for those contracted to receive above £150,000 per year. For organisations who have received grants across multiple rounds of the Culture Recovery Fund, the 18-month period will reset from the date of your most recent funding agreement.

We consider pay restraint to mean, where necessary, making minimal increases to salaries of staff receiving less than £100,000 per year – to ensure the successful execution of your business plan to bring the business back to sustainability. 

You should consider whether a pay increase is required now, or whether it can wait until the 18-month pay restraint period has ended. If a pay increase is deemed necessary, for example, where there is evidence that a pay increase is essential to remaining competitive and recruiting or retaining staff, it should still be carefully considered in terms of affordability and should not risk the financial recovery and/or future viability of the organisation.

During the 18-month period, we also expect organisations to take a proportionate approach to making or paying any dividend, charge, fee or other distribution (or interest on any unpaid dividend, charge, fee or other distribution) – whether in cash or in kind – on or in respect of its share capital (or any class of its share capital or capital), where any legal obligations allow.

Finally, setting the remuneration approach for any organisation in receipt of a Culture Recovery Fund grant is a matter for the board and management to determine. You cannot ask the Arts Council (or DCMS) to endorse or approve the remuneration approach you propose adopting.

My CRF2 application form didn’t include an ‘income’ table – so do I need to fill in the Income and Expenditure table as part of my Activity Report Form? What do I need to include? 

Yes, you should still add in the income that you’ve made in the Activity Report Form. We would only ask to see the income that relates to the activity/project that you outlined in your CRF2 application – however if you’d like to include additional income that relates to your wider organisation’s accounts, you may.  

If you’ve received income from the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme (CJRS), you should include this and explain how this has been used in the box titled ‘finance narrative’, in particular clarifying that the CJRS payments you have received were not intended to cover the same staff costs that you’d included in your CRF application – as this would constitute double funding (please see an FAQ further down this page for more detail). 

Why doesn’t the information from my original application’s cash flow and budget appear in my activity report? 

The budget and cashflow Excel spreadsheets that you submitted as part of your application were used for assessment purposes. These were not submitted into Grantium, so the system cannot populate information from these attachments into the Expenditure and Income tables within your Activity Report Form. Grantium can only pull through information that was directly input into tables that were inbuilt into the application form you submitted. 

In the Activity Report Form Income and Expenditure table you need to supply us with your actual income and expenditure, reflecting the final spending of your grant (to add actual figures for existing expenditure lines, click the ‘View’ icon. You can find more detail in the ‘How to submit a report’ Grantium guidance for applicants, available here, p.11). Please explain differences between your budgeted and actual expenditure in the ‘finance narrative’ section.  

And what do I have to do for the final Payment Request? 

After submitting your final Activity Report Form, you must submit your final Payment Request. As part of this, you must supply a statement of income and expenditure for your activity, which has been certified by an independent qualified accountant (or if your organisation is a Local Authority, University or other statutory body, a qualified accountant from your internal audit function). 

You will attach this Certified Income and Expenditure condition to your final Payment Request step in Grantium. 

This is also where you will attach any other additional information and conditions that we may have asked from you.  

What if I haven’t been able to follow my plan due to changing restrictions, and have kept staff on furlough because I haven’t needed them? (CRF2 recipients) 

It is fine if you have had to change your plans due to restrictions, as long as you’ve spent your grant on eligible costs and explained changes to us in your Activity Report Form. 

However, as outlined in your offer letter, if you had kept staff on furlough for the original CRF Round Two funding period (April-June) when you had included those staff costs in your application, this would constitute as double funding, as you’ll have received Government funding to cover the same cost twice.  

If staffing costs had been included in your application, these funds are not eligible to be repurposed. So, if you had originally intended to meet staff costs through your CRF grant and subsequently claimed funding from the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme to cover the same costs, you must tell us as we will need to reduce your award. 

I have an extra line in my final Activity Report Form income and expenditure table, which I don’t need to use, what do I do?  

If this is the case, it is likely that you have added an extra line to this table in error – all lines added to the income and expenditure table must be completed in full:  

Each line needs a heading, a description, and an amount. If you have created a line in error, use £0 as the amount. 

In order to submit your Activity Report form, you will need to go to the Income and Expenditure section, click ‘view’ to edit the empty/incomplete lines in the table (the view icon is the looking glass at the end of the line).  

You’re unable to remove lines created in error.  

If you’ve added a line in error:  

• select an expenditure/income heading (any heading is fine)   
• put ‘made in error’ or ‘x’ as the description  
• make sure you put £0 in both the budgeted and actual expenditure boxes  
• click ‘save’ when you have made the changes   
  
   

How do I add an expenditure line in my Activity Report Form?  

If you have amended your activity and used your grant on eligible costs not outlined in your original application, you need to reflect this and report on your final actual expenditure figures.  

To do this, you can create new expenditure lines in the table within Grantium (by clicking the ‘Add’ icon. You can find more detail in the ‘How to submit a report’ Grantium guidance for applicants, available here, p.11)  

When do I have to submit all of this by? 

Final Payment Requests and Activity Report Forms should be submitted no later than 30 days after the end date of your grant. 

For Culture Recovery Round One, your eligible funding period ended on 31 March 2021 – so you should have submitted your monitoring information and requested final payment by the end of April. 

If you requested an extension, and this was agreed by us, you must submit your Activity Report Form and Final Payment Request no later than 30 days after the end of that extension.  

For Culture Recovery Fund Round Two, the eligible funding period originally ended on June 30 – however, all CRF2 recipients have had these grants extended until 31 December. This means you can submit your Activity Report Form and request your final payment once you have spent or committed the full amount of the grant that you were awarded. The latest date you can submit is 30 days after the end of the eligible funding period, i.e. 31 January 2022.

Updates 

• Three additional FAQs added 22/07/2021
• Additional information added 02/12/2021

Why do I need to submit a certified income and expenditure document to receive my final payment?

As part of your final payment request, all CRF grant recipients must submit a certified statement of income and expenditure. This condition reflects two sections of the grant terms and conditions, which were agreed when accepting your offer:

3.10 Where requested you must provide us with clear and accurate accounts that cover the period of the Plan. These accounts must follow any relevant legal requirements for accounts, audit or examination of accounts, annual reports or annual returns and must clearly show income and expenditure. We may ask for proof of expenditure or losses.

and

5.6 You will be required to participate in a post-programme evaluation and to comply with proportionate reporting and monitoring arrangements.

What should this document look like?

The statement of income and expenditure must be certified by an independent qualified accountant (or if your organisation is a Local Authority, University or other statutory body, a qualified accountant from your internal audit function).

The certified statement of income and expenditure should demonstrate how you have spent your CRF1 grant within the agreed funding period and reflect what you have reported in your Final Activity Report. You do not need to provide full audited accounts for your organisation.

You should arrange for an independent accountant (it doesn’t have to be an auditor) to look over the income and expenditure and cross reference this with your organisation-wide accounts.

This is necessary to assure us that the income and expenditure declared in your final activity report has in fact gone through your business/organisation. The accountant will need to provide a letter certifying that the income and expenditure declared is accurate and lines up with your organisation’s financial records.

We have no set requirements for the income and expenditure certification, what we are relying on is the accountant’s professional judgement carried out to a specification against which they are willing to declare that the income and expenditure statement within the final activity report is accurate.

We need to be assured that the income and expenditure outlined in the final monitoring report is correct and we will accept a certification done on any basis considered reasonable by the qualified accountant. The certification does not need to come from your usual accountants, but the accountant used must be qualified.

Typical types of acceptable certification we receive include:

• A signed and dated letter (with appropriate header and footer information) from an independent qualified accountant stating that the grant-specific statement of income and expenditure in the Final Activity Report form gives an accurate picture of the project’s income and expenditure.
• A copy of the Final Activity Report form income and expenditure statement stamped and dated by an accountant (with the stamp showing full contact details for the accountant).
• If the organisation is a Local Authority, University or other statutory body, the same documents from a qualified accountant from their internal audit function.

Your accountant should confirm the following:

• Confirmation that the accountant is independent (where applicable)
• Confirmation that the accountant is a member of the CCAB and holds a Practising Certificate
• Confirmation of the percentage of invoices checked as part of the certification
• Confirmation that the grant funds have been used in accordance with ACE Ts & Cs
• Compliance with ICAEW Framework Document for Accountants Reports on Grant Claims

We can accept the submission up to 30 days later than the date stated on Grantium. In specific circumstances we may be able to accept this later, but you should get in touch with us via crf@artscouncil.org.uk to agree this extension

What format does my certified Income and Expenditure statement need to be in? 

We don’t have a specific template for the statement so please use the layout that is best suited to the way your organisation operates, but this must be signed by the independent qualified accountant that has completed the certification. The maximum file size you can upload is 10MB and we accept PDF, MS Word and JPEG files.  

The statement should be attached to your final Payment Request in Grantium – submission line: Payment Request #2 (Final).  

Can we use our annual accounts to meet this payment condition?  

This statement of Income and Expenditure is for the activity linked to your award, and must be certified by an independent qualified accountant (or if your organisation is a Local Authority, University or other statutory body, a qualified accountant from your internal audit function). 

This certified statement of your income and expenditure must relate to specifically to your CRF award – evidencing the activity and costs of your grant.  

You can submit certification of income and expenditure within your audited accounts, if the accounts have a specific section noting and certifying the CRF grant income and expenditure.   

You may be able to align this work to your year-end accounting, if this aligns with the due date for your grant. Final payments should be requested no later than 30 days after the due date, so if the end of your organisation’s financial year was after this 30-day period, you wouldn’t be able to wait.  

For example, if you received a CRF1 grant and had an extension approved until 30 June (and your financial year ended around this time), if your accounts were ready by the end of July – and they included a specific certification of your CRF grant income and expenditure – you could submit this as part of your final payment request.  

However, if you received a CRF2 grant (which has a due date of 31 December 2021), you would not be able to wait for those audited accounts to be ready if your financial year ends March 2022 (as your final payment request would need to be submitted by end of January 2022).  

Please be aware that we aren’t able to release your final payment until we have received all the necessary information. 

How can I submit a final Activity Report / certified Income and Expenditure, if I haven’t had all the money yet? 

To protect public money and ensure that grants are spent on eligible costs, it is a condition of your grant that you will fill in your final Activity Report Form and provide us with a clear picture of your income and expenditure. This includes attaching the Certified Income and Expenditure statement to your final payment request in Grantium before we can release your final payment to you. 

Your Income and Expenditure table on Grantium must cover how you have spent or committed the full grant. We understand that you will not have received your full grant, as you are awaiting final payment, however you can include costs that you have committed and the accountant should still be able to verify your statement of Income and Expenditure for committed spend, by showing contracts and agreements. 

Additionally, you could choose to include reflating your reserves as committed spend or use free reserves that you have available to you to spend on costs relating to your activity, replenishing these once final payment is received.   

Why have I been asked to submit ‘an improved and updated diversity milestone plan’ as part of our final payment condition for our CRF (Round 2) grant?

As part of your application to the second round of the Culture Recovery Fund, you were asked to answer the following question (p.32 in the guidance for applicants):

Q6. Please tell us how you will open up access by improving the diversity of your audiences, visitors, participants, workforce and governance?

You will need to tell us:

• what steps you will take to broaden the diversity of your workforce and governance, including socioeconomic diversity, and the impact of those changes
• what steps you will take to broaden the diversity of your audiences, visitor base and participants, including socioeconomic diversity, and the impact of those changes

The requirement to provide a diversity milestone plan was applied to those awarded CRF (Round 2) grants who scored ‘not met’ in their application. If the plan that you have submitted was not sufficient, we are asking you to submit an updated and improved plan as part of your final payment request.

How was my diversity milestone plan assessed?

The prompts used by reviewers in determining whether the plan was sufficient or not were:

• Does the diversity milestone plan set out how the organisation will take steps to broaden their diversity in terms of (where relevant) audiences, visitors, participants, workforce and/or governance;
• Do proposed plans appear reasonable, in line with the size and type of organisation;
• Do the proposed plans demonstrate a credible case that improved outcomes will be achieved; and
• Is the timescale within the plan realistic, does the plan include credible milestones to support any stated ambition and does it take account of the interest through CRF2 in the viability and sustainability of the organisation for 18 months from the grant award date?

What does our updated diversity milestone plan need to include to meet this condition?

We have identified the following areas that could be consistently improved, having reviewed plans received to date:

• Timeframes: effective plans included a series of milestones with different dates across the period of activity, building towards a final project completion date, as opposed to a single date when many milestones would be completed. Diversity Milestone Plans should cover at least an 18 month period from the point of award.
• Milestones: some plans provided narrative on the activity organisations would undertake but did not include milestones to demonstrate how that activity would be achieved. Effective plans included a series of milestones, which showed how each element of the activity would be delivered.
• Accountability: effective plans clearly set out who was responsible for each objective within the overall activity with a clear reporting process to or oversight from the relevant management team or board.
• Scope: the term diversity refers to a broad range of considerations, particularly the ‘protected characteristics’ as defined in the Equality Act 2010, and are not restricted to physical access or ethnicity. Organisations should also consider the impact of socio-economic diversity. Effective plans will consider a range of activities to enable opening up access to a broad range of people, within the context of the individual organisation.
• Relevance: we do not expect all grant recipients to respond to both prompts. For example, a supply chain haulage company is unlikely to undertake substantial audience facing activity, and so an effective diversity milestone plan would focus on broadening the diversity of its workforce and governance. Organisations that delivery public facing activity, like theatres and museums for example, would include consideration of their audiences, as well as workforce and governance.
• Lack of detail: some plans included broad, generic aims and ambitions, and lacked detail regarding how these might be achieved within the context of the organisation and the timescale provided. Effective plans might include longer term ambitions, but also include a realistic, planned approach with clear milestones that show how all ambitions will be achieved.
• Improvement: some organisations resubmitted the text provided within the original application, which had already been deemed ‘not met’ during its initial assessment. An effective response would have provided an updated approach taking account of the written assessment (where relevant) or existing guidance from the Arts Council.
  
   

In some cases, applicants did not provide a diversity milestone plan at all; included a generic equality action plan, mission statement or access plan; or a policy for a broader organisation, such as a university or local authority. Some organisations included diversity plans from other organisations, with amended logos and organisation names, but identical content.

Effective diversity milestone plans will be specific to the organisation or department within a broader organisation in receipt of a Culture Recovery Fund grant, with clear SMART objectives to aim towards and track improvement.

Further detail regarding the Arts Council’s approach to inclusivity and relevance can be found here.

Please note: On 4 January 2023, the Subsidy Control Act replaced EU state aid rules. The below FAQs only apply to recipients of the Culture Recovery Fund. Find more information about Subsidy Control >

Why do I need to consider and confirm that the grant needs to comply with Subsidy Control regulations? Can you advise on whether the grant offered is not ‘Subsidy Control’?

In receiving this offer of funding, you have acknowledged that the grant comes from public funds and the need to comply with the UK Subsidy Control regime. As of 1 January 2021, EU state aid rules no longer apply in the UK for new subsidies awarded after that date, except where the grant funding will affect trade between Northern Ireland and the EU as envisaged by Article 10 of the Protocol on Ireland/Northern Ireland in the EU Withdrawal Agreement.

The UK has entered into a Trade and Cooperation Agreement with the EU which contains certain subsidy control provisions which govern the award of subsidies by UK public authorities and that may affect trade or investment between the UK and the EU. The current rules are explained in BEIS’ guidance, Technical guidance on the UK’s international subsidy control commitments, available here. Further legislation and guidance in this area is expected in the coming months.

You must ensure that the grant funding awarded to you is compliant with any legislation on subsidy control applicable at the time the grant is awarded. You must provide any information we request in order to satisfy us that you have considered the subsidy control rules and that the grant is compliant. The Arts Council cannot advise on whether individual grants constitute Subsidy Control, if you are unsure about your obligations, you may wish to take professional or legal advice.

What are the Subsidy Control rules?

The Subsidy Control rules are the new legal requirements that apply to the award of subsidies in the United Kingdom with effect from 11pm on 31 December 2020. They have largely replaced EU state aid rules.

What steps does an applicant need to take to satisfy the rules?

The Arts Council needs to know whether the funding constitutes a “Subsidy”. Many awards to arts sector organisations will not be classed as a subsidy. Therefore to assess this, we ask the applicant to provide a declaration.

What awards might not be a subsidy at all?

Many organisations in the arts sector are not set up on strictly commercial terms. This is important because where funding is not regarded as “economic activity” or is not to an “economic actor” then no subsidy is considered to arise.

In this regard, we note that the definition of what is a “subsidy” under the new rules is substantively similar to what is a State aid within the previous EU law regime. That regime recognised that certain activities related to culture, heritage and nature conservation may be organised in a non-commercial way and thus be non-economic in nature. 

Paragraph 34 of the Notion of State aid provides more information, but this includes situations where public funding is provided for cultural activities for which the “general public are required to pay a monetary contribution that only covers a fraction of the true costs”. 

Where can applicants find more detailed guidance?

The Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy has published guidance on Subsidy Control which can be found here. 

What happens when a Subsidy is present?

Where a subsidy is present, we will contact the applicant with further information and they will be invited to either:

• demonstrate that the Small Amounts of Financial Assistance provision is met; or
• show the six Common Principles at 3.4 of the Trade and Cooperation Agreement with the EU (TCA) are satisfied. 

More information on both options is set out in the declaration. 

If a subsidy is present, but a compliant route cannot be identified, then the award of public funding will be cancelled.

The above contains guidance upon how to comply with the Subsidy Control rules, but does not constitute legal advice and should be read with reference to the relevant legislation and guidance published by the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, which can be found on gov.uk. The Arts Council England does not accept any liability with regard to the use of the contents of these FAQs.

What is PEA?

Post event assurance is an activity undertaken after completion of a funding scheme, or towards the end of it. It consists of a number of checks against a sample of grant recipients to provide assurance that Arts Council funding has been issued correctly, and/ or funding has been spent appropriately in line with grant Ts & Cs and eligibility criteria. It’s an extremely important step in doing our part to protect public funds and detect potentially fraudulent activity.

Which Terms & Conditions does PEA relate to?

Upon accepting Arts Council funding, applicants agree to our grant terms and conditions which allow Arts Council to make requests for information relating to the applicant, and use of the grant. The terms and conditions specific to PEA are: 

• You must ensure that all records, including financial records, relating to the Project are accurate and up to date. You must keep these records for seven years after the Project has finished.
• You must give us, or any person nominated by us, access to all records relating to the Project or other projects funded by us upon demand, including (but not limited to) accounts and any other financial records, VAT and any other tax records. We can ask for access to these records for up to seven years after the Project has finished.
• You must send us any information and records that we reasonably require to monitor your Project and how the grant is being used.

See the full grant terms and conditions.

What does it mean for me?

If you/ your organisation is selected to provide additional information for PEA purposes, you will receive an email detailing exactly what we need from you. This email will always come from pea@artscouncil.org.uk.

What do I have to do if my grant is selected?

As PEA can differ from scheme to scheme, there is no “one size fits all” approach. The email we send to you will detail what you need to do and what (if anything) we need from you. 

How long do I have to provide the information requested?

A timeframe will be detailed in your email. If you don’t think you can meet the deadline, please let us know by responding to the email. 

I’ve been asked for evidence of my grant expenditure, what do you need exactly?

This means we need to see invoices, bank statements and/or agreements/ funding commitments of 100% of your grant expenditure to fulfil this request. Your expenditure should be detailed on an expenditure table which can be found in the email we’ve sent you, and should correspond with what you’ve reported, or plan on reporting in your Final Activity Report. If you are unsure what you need to provide, please contact us.

I’ve been asked for evidence of my grant expenditure, but I don’t have any evidence, what do I do?

As per the Arts Council grant terms and conditions, all successful grant applicants are required to retain all evidence related to their grant for seven years after the grant has been closed. Failure to provide the requested information would be a breach of terms and conditions and we could withdraw your grant if we can not be assured that the funding has been spent appropriately.

What happens if I don’t respond?

If you are struggling to meet your deadline, please contact us. If you fail to respond to a PEA request for information, this would be a breach of Arts Council terms and conditions and we may withhold future payments and/or withdraw your grant and request funds back from you. This isn’t a decision we take lightly - we realise how important Arts Council funding is to individuals and organisations across the industry, so it’s really important that you contact us if you cannot provide the requested information or cannot meet the deadline. 

This document has been developed to support you in submitting your activity report form and request for the final payment of your CRF grant. These steps are crucial in ensuring that we’re protecting public funds.

You can download the guidance for applicants in large print format below and an audio version here.

If you require a copy of this guidance in other formats, please contact our Customer Services team.