Guidance

LCEA financial monitoring tool 2023/24

Our Excel-based tool and user guide have been designed to help employers ensure the minimum level of funds for LCEA investment in 2023/24.

14 July 2023

This resource will help employers to:

  • ensure minimum level of funds for investment in local clinical excellence awards (LCEAs) in 2023/24 have been allocated

  • develop the financial element of their end of year report.

Future LCEA award rounds form part of the consultant offer being put to vote by trade unions in an effort to resolve the current industrial action dispute. If members vote in favor of the offer, the contractual entitlement to new LCEAs will cease from 1 April 2024. The 2023/24 award round should continue to progress as agreed and planned locally to ensure that the required minimum investment funds are spent on eligible consultants. Employers may decide to pause development work on 2024/25 award round designs whilst the vote takes place. We expect the outcome of the vote to be announced by the 25 January 2024.

How to use the spreadsheet

  • All blue cells require employer inputs.

Download the LCEA financial monitoring spreadsheet (MS Excel).

LCEA financial monitoring tool user guide

Use our guide to help you navigate and use the Excel based tool.

Download the guide (PDF).

Funding of the awards

The minimum investment level is to be calculated using this (much simpler) formula:

FTE x £7,900 

*(not including national insurance and employer pension contributions)

There is no longer an ‘investment ratio’ or a cumulative element to the calculation. However, some complexity does remain when taking into account the costs of maintaining existing LCEAs, i.e. awards granted prior to 1 April 2018.

Before new awards, the following must be paid from this pot:

  • pre-2018 existing LCEAs
  • costs associated with any necessary reversions for consultants who have lost national clinical impact awards
  • any new LCEA of greater than one year’s duration that are paid beyond April 2022.

There will be variation in the amount of funds trusts have available to spend. This may affect your flexibility to run schemes in some areas, as some organisations will have many pre-2018 awards to pay out before they can invest in new awards. This trend is not expected to last long-term and all pots should increase over the next few years as consultants, with old-style awards, retire. 

Previous financial tools