Founders and Coders
If your employer pays the Apprenticeship Levy, they've already contributed this money; it's sitting in a ring-fenced account waiting to be spent. This programme is a way for them to get real value from funds they've already paid, rather than letting them expire unused.
The Apprenticeship Levy is a payroll tax that applies to all UK employers with an annual pay bill exceeding £3 million. If your organisation falls into this category, you pay 0.5% of your total payroll into a ring-fenced digital account each month, collected via PAYE.
How the levy account works: The money accumulates in your Apprenticeship Service account and can only be spent on approved apprenticeship training and assessment. The government adds a 10% top-up to your contributions, so for every £1 you pay in, you have £1.10 available to spend. Funds enter your account monthly and remain available for 24 months; after that, any unspent balance expires.
Spending your levy: When you enrol an apprentice, the training costs are drawn from your levy account. Each apprenticeship standard sits within a funding band (ranging from £1,500 to £27,000) that sets the maximum the government will contribute. For the Level 6 Machine Learning Engineer apprenticeship, the funding band is £22,000.
Employers with an annual pay bill under £3 million do not pay the Apprenticeship Levy, but you can still access government funding for apprenticeship training through co-investment.
The 95/5 split: Under the standard co-investment model, the government pays 95% of the training and assessment costs, and your organisation contributes the remaining 5%. For a Level 6 Machine Learning Engineer apprenticeship priced at the £22,000 funding band maximum, this means an employer contribution of £1,100 spread across the duration of the programme.
If your organisation doesn't pay the levy (or pays the levy but has exhausted your funds), there's another option: receiving a transfer of unused levy from a larger employer.
How levy transfers work: Levy-paying employers can transfer up to 25% of their annual levy funds to other organisations. Many large employers actively look to transfer unused funds rather than let them expire, and some do this through public pledge schemes or partnerships with local authorities and sector bodies.
What this means for you: A levy transfer covers 100% of the apprenticeship training costs. You pay nothing for the training and assessment; the transferred funds cover what would otherwise be your 5% contribution, and the government continues to fund the remaining 95% from the apprenticeship budget.
We can help arrange a transfer: We work with a network of levy-paying employers who have pledged to transfer funds to support apprenticeship training. If your organisation is eligible and you'd like to explore this option, we can connect you with potential transfer partners and handle the administrative process. This is particularly valuable for smaller employers who want to invest in their team's development without any direct training costs.