Financial guidance on the COVID-19 vaccination programme
An overview of NHS England and NHS Improvement guidance on vaccination programme routes to payment.
On 29 January, NHS England and NHS Improvement issued financial guidance on the COVID-19 vaccination programme, covering a number of routes of payment. This briefing from the PCN Network provides the key points on reasonable additional costs – claims that relate to one-off and additional setup expenses.
Key points
- £20 million has been made available to local systems and primary care providers.
- It is a Section 7a programme and responsibility lies with regions.
- Claims for costs that are already funded by other routes will not be authorised.
- Claims must relate to one-off and additional setup expenses.
- NHSEI may also need to call on this funding for additional clinical waste costs linked to delivery by PCN groupings.
- Reimbursement is based on actual costs and restricted to:
- additional venue hire and associated costs (inc. VAT) – where a community or commercial venue has been used as last resort with a licence period until 31 March 2021.
- specific and reasonable security costs – as advised by local police.
- additional items – for local requirements that haven’t been covered by the central provision, including items listed on SIL that have not been made available. PCNs should discuss with CCGs whether local procurement can be reimbursed as part of setup costs.
- The Lead GP practice for each PCN is responsible for making claims and receiving reimbursement.
- PCN groupings should work with CCGs to identify delivery model needs and seek pre-authorisation for the plans to meet those needs.
- The Lead GP Practice should submit claims to the CCG within four weeks of pre-authorisation, including evidence and/or invoices.
- CCGs assess the claim against the guidance and forward the recommendation for payment to the region.
- Regions will then approve the payment and reimburse the lead GP practice through the Manual Payment Process.
- Regions must describe the manual payment transactions as reasonable additional COVID-19 costs, and ensure they are coded correctly. Further information on how this is coded is in the guidance.
- Once approved, the transaction will be available to pay on the NHSE next scheduled payment run.
- Regions must make sure all payments, including retrospective ones, are recorded with the correct code in the ledger.
- Regions will be reimbursed for approved costs via the monthly reimbursement process following review of the Non ISFE returns.
- CCGs and the regions should not introduce overly burdensome administrative processes.
- CCGs and regions are responsible for ensuring good financial governance and transparency.
- CCGs are responsible for ensuring duplicate claims are disregarded.
- Regions are expected to manage claims with the regional fixed funding envelope, exceeding this is at their own risk.
- Email payment queries to england.pccovidvaccine@nhs.net
