How to register with the Office for Students

30. The application requirements notice (see Annex A) sets out the information and documentation required at the start and during the registration process. It is essential that your provider’s application is in the ‘manner and form’ set out in the application requirements notice and contains all the information the notice requires.
31. If your provider’s application is not in the manner and/or form set out in the application requirements notice or does not include all the information specified in the application requirements notice, we will issue a provisional decision to refuse your provider’s application. Your provider will then have no less than 28 days to provide the missing information, address any deficiencies in the application and make representations, in line with section 4 of HERA. We may then decide to proceed to a final refusal decision if the required information is submitted but deemed insufficient or if it does not rectify the application to the necessary standard. If you do not submit the required information within the representation period and unless any representations change our view, we will normally issue a final decision to refuse your provider’s application.
32. It is therefore important that, before you apply, you read carefully the application requirements notice and all our guidance about how to register, including the supporting documents listed at the end of this guidance.
33. When you submit an application, we will confirm that we have received it and whether it meets the requirements set out in the application requirements notice.
34. Please note the application requirements notice lists all the requirements, only some of which are referred to below, and your application must meet all requirements in the notice. You must refer to the application requirements notice at Annex A to ensure that your provider’s application complies, and continues to comply, with the notice.²⁵

Application forms

35. Providers will need to complete and submit the OfS’s registration application forms.
36. Details of how to do this are available in the following supporting documents:
    • Annex C: ‘How to complete application forms 1 and 2’
    • Annex D: ‘How to submit an application on the portal’

University title permission

37. Providers that wish to register using the term 'university' or 'university college' need to apply to the Department of Education. Before you can apply to register, your provider will need a ‘non-objection letter’ from the Department of Education that gives it permission to use these sensitive terms.
38. Details are available at ‘Use of university, polytechnic and higher education in business and company names (other than for university and university college title)’.

Corporate structure and ownership

39. Providers will need to submit a diagram showing the provider’s corporate structure and ownership. The full requirements of the diagram are set out in the application requirements notice.

Declaration of investigations

40. As part of our assessment of your provider’s registration application, we will gather information about any investigations taking place into your provider. Providers will need to complete the OfS’s investigations declaration form. This is available from the list of supporting documents. For further information about how we consider investigations during the registration process, see section 4 of this guidance.

Access and participation

41. One of the OfS’s primary regulatory objectives is to ensure that all students, from all backgrounds, with the ability and desire to undertake higher education, are supported to access, succeed in, and progress from higher education.
42. Access and participation plans are one of the regulatory tools we deploy to facilitate the achievement of our objectives, and our decisions in connection with such plans are an example of where we have ‘had regard to’ equality of opportunity.²⁶ We expect a provider’s access and participation plan to clearly set out the key risks to equality of opportunity that current and prospective students are facing, and how it will address these.
43. If you are applying to the Approved (fee cap) category and intend to charge higher fees, you will need an access and participation plan that meets our requirements and supporting information about fees, targets and investment.²⁷
44. If you are applying to the Approved category or applying to the Approved (fee cap) category and intend to charge basic fees, you will need an access and participation statement and a link to where this is published.²⁸

Quality and standards

45. It is important that English higher education delivers a high quality academic experience for all students and that qualifications awarded are credible. This means that providers need to meet our requirements for the quality and standards of the courses they offer.²⁹
46. We set out our requirements for quality and standards in our ‘B conditions’. For initial condition B7, providers seeking registration must have credible plans to comply with ongoing conditions for academic support (condition B1), resources, support and student engagement (condition B2) and assessment and awards (condition B4). They must also have the capacity and resources necessary to deliver those plans. Your application should include a quality plan that explains how you will meet the requirements of our ongoing conditions of registration for quality, including supporting evidence. You should also include an itemised list of each piece of supporting evidence submitted. Annex G: ‘Your quality plan and supporting evidence for condition B7’ sets out detailed information about what your quality plan should cover, and your plan must meet the requirements set out in the application requirements notice.
47. For initial condition B8, you will need to complete and submit Annex I: 'Provider information template B8’, which gives us information about your provider’s compliance with standards for higher education. For further information see Annex H: ‘Guidance for providers on the assessment of initial condition B8’.
48. Any provider that is referred for a quality and standards assessment as part of the assessment of its registration application will be required to submit proof of payment, by the agreed deadline, of the fee for the OfS’s quality and standards assessment.

Treating students fairly

49. Condition C5 requires providers to treat students fairly:
    • students should receive clear, accurate and timely information
    • their relationship with their university or college should be governed by fair terms and conditions
    • there should be fair mechanisms for dealing with complaints, refunds and compensation.
50. Students should be able to understand the protections available to them in circumstances where the provider can no longer deliver their course (either at all or in the manner advertised). 
51. Your application should include information that helps us to assess your compliance with our requirement that your provider treats students fairly. This includes:
    • template contract(s) that set out terms and conditions for the provision of higher education
    • complaints process(es) related to the provision of higher education – where there are different processes for different categories of student, you must submit them all
    • any policy (or policies) that set out the terms for refund and compensation for higher education students.
      
      What you are required to submit in respect of condition C5 is set out in the application requirements notice.
52. You will also need to complete the following documents in the list of supporting documents:
    • Annex J: ‘C5 declaration form’
    • Annex K: ‘C5 Checklist’

Financial viability and sustainability

53. What you are required to submit in respect of financial viability and sustainability (condition D) is set out in the application requirements notice. For further information see Annex L: ‘Guidance for providers about the financial information required for registration’. You will need to supply:
    • financial and student number tables (Annex M) with a detailed commentary (Annex N). If a third party is guaranteeing financial support to the provider, it must include a legally binding obligation of financial support from the third party, and audited financial statements for the previous three years for that third party. For further information see Annex L: ‘Guidance for providers about financial information required for registration’
    • financial scenario planning to be included in the financial tables with financial commentary and any mitigating actions
    • for providers that have been operating for more than three years, full audited (and where providers have subsidiaries, consolidated) financial statements for the three most recent years
    • for providers that have been operating for fewer than three years, full audited financial statements for as many of the last three years as they have provided higher education
    • audited financial statements for any financial years that are completed after the provider’s initial submission of its registration application to be submitted within nine months of the provider’s financial year end
    • updated financial and student number tables and commentary to be submitted after the quality and standards assessment is complete. You are required to submit this information within 60 working days of our request.

Effective governance

54. To show that you have effective governance arrangements (condition E7), you will need to supply:
    • all documents that establish the provider and set out the rules governing how it is constituted and governed
    • governing body documents
    • risk and audit documents
    • decision-making documents
    • conflict of interests policy
    • any other documents (including shareholder agreements) which contain rules which govern the operation of the provider’s governing body
    • a business plan that meets the requirements set out in initial condition E7.5.

Fraud and protecting public funding

55. To show that you have arrangements in place which are adequate and effective for preventing, detecting and stopping fraud and the inappropriate use of public funds (condition E8), you will need to supply:
    • a completed ‘Fraud and public funding declaration form’ using the template provided by the OfS (Annex O)
    • any document(s) that identify risks and corresponding mitigations relating to the prevention of fraud and protection of public funds (for example a risk register or relevant excerpts from a risk register)
    • any document(s) that set out the provider’s internal control processes relating to the prevention of fraud and protection of public funds
    • a whistleblowing policy
    • an anti-bribery policy
    • any other documents (including any policies or procedures) that set out how the provider prevents fraud or the inappropriate use of public funds.

Knowledge and expertise and fit and proper persons

56. A provider must ensure that relevant individuals within its organisation are ‘fit and proper’ for the purposes of ensuring that:
    • the provider is suitable to access and receive public funds
    • public trust and confidence in the higher education sector are maintained
    • the provider is suitable to protect the interests of students.
57. These requirements are covered by condition E9. For this, you will need to supply:
    • any policies and/or procedures that explain how the provider ensures individuals are fit and proper, including at least one of a description of its procedures for checking relevant individuals are fit and proper or a policy that sets this out
    • any policies and/or processes that the provider has in place to ensure that relevant individuals are able, by reason of their physical and mental health, to properly perform the tasks of the office or position to which they are appointed
    • a declaration stating whether the provider is aware of any indicative matters as listed in E9.5 and E9.7, for the purposes of initial condition E9.4, for any relevant individuals
    • the full name, contact details (email address and phone number), date of birth (day/month/year) of each of the provider’s relevant individuals (as set out in the registration application form 2).
58. Further details of how to do this are covered by the following documents in the list of supporting documents:
    • Annex R: ‘Guidance for providers on the interview process’
    • Annex S: ‘Guidance for providers on Fit and Proper Persons (FPP)’

Notes

[25] See Annex A: Application requirements notice at Supporting documents.

[26] As stipulated in HERA and the Equality Act 2010.

[27] OfS, ‘Regulatory notice 1: Access and participation plan guidance’.

[28] See Condition A2: Access and participation statement.

[29] See How we regulate quality and standards.

59. Providers can apply to register at any time. If, however, your provider wants to access specific benefits by a particular date, it should plan accordingly.
60. We cannot give a precise timescale for how long it will take us to assess an application. The indicative time to register a provider is typically one year, but the circumstances of the application mean that this can vary. The section on ‘Assessment’ below indicates how long our assessment and decision-making process takes.

Accessing student support

61. Access to student support is available only to eligible students studying on eligible courses (as defined under the Education (Student Support) Regulations 2011) at a registered provider.³⁰ If your provider wishes to have its students access student support at the start of their academic year, you should allow sufficient time for us to assess your provider’s application and reach a decision.

If your provider is applying in the Approved (fee cap) category and wants to charge fees up to the higher amount, you must submit an access and participation plan. This submission has deadlines to ensure that an approved plan is in place for the start of the appropriate academic year. We have published the deadlines in our information about when to submit a plan.³¹

Communicating with students and applicants

62. If a student starts their course before your provider is registered, and your provider’s application is then unsuccessful, the student will not have access to student support. Your provider must make it absolutely clear to students and applicants that it may have submitted an application to register with the OfS, but a successful outcome (and the timing of that outcome) is not guaranteed. We have set out below some suggested wording that your provider may use when communicating with applicants and students.
63. In these communications, your provider must also ensure it complies with consumer protection law and follow guidance published by the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA).³² Any information your provider communicates to students and potential students must be clear about the status of its application and the implications of this. We suggest using the following or similar wording:

    ‘Before you can access any student support, [name of provider] must be registered with the regulator for higher education in England, the Office for Students (OfS).

    [Name of provider] has applied to register with the OfS but is not currently registered. You will only be able to access student support if our application is successful.

    We will write to confirm the outcome of our application as soon as we hear from the OfS. To find out more about student support and registering with the OfS, visit: www.officeforstudents.org.uk/studentfinance/’

64. For more information about treating students fairly, see initial condition of registration C5.³³

[30] See The Education (Student Support) Regulations 2011.

[31] See When to submit a plan.

[32] GOV.UK, ‘Higher education: consumer law advice for providers’.

[33] See Annex A: Application requirements notice at Supporting documents.

65. During the registration process you are required to report specified matters to us that may affect your provider’s application to register. These are set out in full in the application requirements notice.³⁴ They include but are not limited to:
    1. Changes to the legal form, ownership or control of your provider.
    2. Changes in relevant individuals at your provider.
    3. Changes to your strategy or the delivery of your current or planned higher education provision.
    4. Changes to your provider’s financial position.
    5. Changes to particular documents submitted with your registration application.
66. You are required to provide this information within 28 working days of the change or event occurring. These matters could have a material impact on our assessment of your provider’s compliance with the initial conditions of registration or your provider’s eligibility for registration.
67. You should consider the following when deciding when to report the matters set out in schedule 1 part B of the application requirements notice. Where your provider or its owner is planning, or can foresee, an event or matter that is included in schedule 1 part B of the application requirements notice at Annex A, the event should be reported within 28 days of the matter being ‘first contemplated’ by the provider. ‘First contemplated’ means when the provider first formally discusses its plans or the matter with its governing body, owners or shareholders, even where details may not be firm. A provider is not expected to report to the OfS when a matter of this kind is first considered or discussed informally by individual office holders.
68. You will be required to submit information about these matters even if the matter has been resolved by the time you report it. While you are encouraged to provide contextual information at the time of reporting, such as any steps your providers has taken in response to the matter and any resolution of the matter, we may still ask follow-up questions and seek clarification in writing if needed.

Notes

[34] See Schedule 1 Part B of Annex A: Application requirements notice at Supporting documents.

69. We recognise that you will need to familiarise yourself with a substantial amount of information before starting to develop an application for registration. You may benefit from an opportunity to discuss your planned application and ensure you have fully engaged with, and understood, our requirements in detail. We offer a pre-application virtual meeting for any provider planning to seek registration. You can request this at any time during your application. To get the most benefit from the meeting, we strongly recommend you do so after you have read the guidance through at least once.
70. The pre-application virtual meeting is an opportunity for you to ask any questions about the application requirements notice and our guidance. It is intended to support your understanding of our registration requirements. We will expect you to have read the application requirements notice and relevant guidance before the meeting. Please be aware that our engagement will not include business or strategic advice.
71. For any enquiries related to your registration application, please contact [email protected].

72. Providers must submit their application through the registration sections of the OfS portal. We have provided detailed information about how you can access the portal and submit your application through it at Annex D: ‘How to submit an application on the portal’. This explains:
    • technical information about how to submit your application and supporting evidence using the OfS portal (part 1)
    • a checklist to assist you with submitting an application. It also outlines the sections of the OfS portal where each piece of evidence must be submitted (part 2).