Once your child or young person has an EHC plan, your local authority (LA) must ensure the special educational provision set out in the plan is made for them.

Normally, your LA will do this by providing the necessary funding to your child’s school or college, in order for them to deliver the educational support needed, and by arranging any external therapies or other special educational provision that may be specified. However, it is also possible for your LA to consider making a payment to you (as a parent or young person), or another nominated person, so that you can organise the provision yourself. This is called a direct payment. In order for you to request a direct payment, your  LA must first identify a personal budget.

What is a personal budget?

A personal budget is the estimated amount of money which would be needed to cover the cost of making the special educational provision specified in the EHC plan. It is a ‘notional’ amount, which means it is available in theory and is not a cash sum which you can expect to be paid. You cannot have a personal budget for education unless you have an EHC plan. Information about the availability of personal budgets must be contained in your LA’s local offer.

Personal budgets are optional, so you do not have to have one. If you would like your LA to identify a personal budget you can make a request for it to do so. You can do this when your LA issues a draft EHC plan following an EHC needs assessment or reassessment, or when it is reviewing an EHC plan. It is not legally required to consider identifying a personal budget for educational provision at other times.

Your LA must normally prepare a personal budget if you request one. However sometimes, it may not be able to do so, such as when the special educational provision is being provided as part of a larger budget (for example, a contract with the NHS to provide all speech and language therapy or occupational therapy) and the LA can’t separate out (or ‘disaggregate’) the personal budget for your child from that overall larger budget. In these circumstances, your LA can refuse to prepare a personal budget. 

How will a personal budget be delivered?

The SEND Code of Practice 2015 (the Code) suggests four different ways in which a personal budget can be delivered, at paragraph 9.101. The ways  you can be involved in securing provision are through:

• Direct payments: This is where you would receive cash payments to enable you to contract, purchase and manage the services yourself.
• An arrangement: Your LA, school or college would hold the funds and commission the special educational provision that is specified in the EHC plan. An arrangement can sometimes be referred to as a notional budget.
• Third party arrangements: The funds would be paid to and managed by an individual or an organisation on your behalf.
• A combination of the above: It is possible for a personal budget to be delivered through a combination of the above three methods.

How can I get a direct payment?

If you do request a personal budget from your LA, you can at the same time ask it to identify which parts of the personal budget you could then receive as a direct payment, so that you could commission or arrange the provision in the EHC plan yourself. The direct payment must be enough to cover the cost of arranging the provision.

You can use our template letter to help you make a request for a personal budget (and a direct payment, if you want one).

Your LA can refuse to make a direct payment if it thinks the person receiving the payments would not be capable of managing the money, or if it thinks the money would be used in an inappropriate way. It can also refuse to make a direct payment where this would negatively impact other services provided by the LA, or if it would not be an efficient use of resources.

Where the direct payment is intended to fund provision which is to be delivered in a school or college setting, the consent of the head teacher or principal is required. If they do not consent, then your LA will be unable to make a direct payment.

It can be helpful to remember that the purpose of a personal budget or direct payment is to allow you to arrange provision that is specified in Section F of the EHC plan yourself. It is not a pot of money for additional provisions like home tuition, after-school activities, additional therapies or anything else that is not specified in Section F.

What if my LA won’t provide a personal budget/ direct payment?

If your LA refuses to identify a personal budget or make a direct payment, you cannot appeal to the SEND Tribunal against that decision, but you can ask for it to be formally reviewed by your LA. If you disagree with your LA’s decision and/or you do not think your request was considered fairly, you can take action.  

Where can I find out more?

Detailed information about personal budgets and direct payments is contained in Chapter 9 of the Code. The law relating to direct payments and personal budgets is set out in the Special Educational Needs (Personal Budgets) Regulations 2014, as amended by the Special Educational Needs (Miscellaneous Amendments) Regulations 2014.

Following receipt of several complaints about how LAs deal with requests for personal budgets and direct payments, the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman (LGSCO) published a focus report. LGSCO decisions are not legally binding, however  the report contains further helpful information and case studies, showing how it considered complaints of this type, along with some guidance for LAs on the information they should provide and procedures they should follow.