The Education Authority has introduced tighter spending controls for schools after delivering approximately £30 million in savings this year, mostly through cuts to centrally delivered services. In guidance issued to schools, the authority said further action is necessary to make education more financially sustainable, noting that a significant proportion of expenditure is incurred by schools and that additional savings cannot be achieved without affecting school spending.

Under the new arrangements, all schools' expenditure requires budget cover regardless of their financial position. Additional scrutiny and control now applies to expenditure requests processed through the Oracle iproc system, with a revised delegation limit applying to all schools, including those in surplus or deficit. Voluntary grammar and grant maintained schools, which use a different ordering system, are expected to apply the same level of financial control.

Requisitions above the threshold will be reviewed weekly. Due to the volume of requests, decisions may take several weeks and consideration within a specific timeframe cannot be guaranteed. Schools will receive standard notifications through iProc when a requisition is approved or rejected, though in some cases further information may be sought. If that information is not provided within four weeks, the requisition will be rejected. There is no mechanism for schools to challenge a decision, and the authority said it will be unable to respond to individual queries.

The authority said previous contingency funding for in-year enrolment growth, split site costs and errors in formula funding is no longer available. It also confirmed that some earmarked funding for services and programmes additional to core statutory duties was not allocated this year following a Department of Education review. No further allocations can be made for those programmes, and schools have been asked to wind down related activities and avoid further expenditure. Shared Education Development Officers will contact partnerships to outline steps for recording activity and expenditure for the 2026/2027 financial year. Shared Education Campuses and the PEACEPLUS ASPIRE programme funded by SEUPB are not affected.