Monitoring update: April 2022

At the TEC, we gather a range of information about common issues through our monitoring activities. We’re committed to partnering with tertiary education organisations and sharing learnings from our monitoring work to help the sector build capability so we can all achieve better outcomes for learners.

This update includes information about:

Changes to delivery sites

We have recently received enquiries from several tertiary education organisations (TEOs) regarding making changes to their delivery site details.

As a reminder, you can view, edit or delete delivery site information through STEO. Further details on how to do this are available in the STEO user guide on pages 37-43.

If you are making edits to a delivery site, or deleting a site, you do not need to notify the TEC of this. However, you must ensure all reporting requirements have been completed against the delivery site before you are able to make any updates to it in STEO.

It is important that your delivery site details are up to date to ensure accurate reporting to the TEC as well as wider sector reporting to the Ministry of Education.

If you require assistance with updating your delivery site details in STEO, please contact the TEC by phoning 0800 601 301 or emailing customerservice@tec.govt.nz.

Reviewing your funding in-year and seeking a plan reduction

The impact of the COVID-19 pandemic has provided significant challenges for the tertiary sector. While the TEC did not recover some funding from TEOs who under-delivered in 2020 because of the COVID-19 pandemic, this funding guarantee did not apply for 2021 and some TEOs have faced significant repayments to the TEC as a result.

To reduce the likelihood of significant repayments at the end of this year, and the financial pressures this can create, we recommend you review your 2022 TEC funding following submission of your April Single Data Return (SDR).

Where your April SDR figures indicate your full funding won’t be consumed in 2022; you should request an in-year plan reduction.

If you have questions regarding under-delivery or seeking a plan reduction, please contact your relationship manager, relationship advisor or email customerservice@tec.govt.nz.

Fees Free interaction with courses that have zero fees

Fees Free covers an eligible learner’s first year of provider-based study at level 3 or above on the New Zealand Qualifications Framework, and this is measured in both EFTS and dollars. As a reminder, courses with zero tuition fees or compulsory course costs, that meet the course eligibility criteria, are still using a learner’s Fees Free entitlement in EFTS.

It is important that learners are aware of this when they enrol in these courses and that you are accurately reporting these enrolments in your Fees Free All Enrolments and Costs as usual, with $0.00 in the fee columns.

This allows us to accurately track learner entitlement use, in both EFTS and dollars, and allocate payments correctly when learners are enrolled with multiple TEOs.

If you, or your learners, have questions regarding courses that have zero fees and how this impacts their Fees Free entitlement, please contact the TEC by phoning 0800 601 301 or emailing customerservice@tec.govt.nz.

Targeted Training and Apprenticeship Fund education and training start dates and refunds

Through our monitoring activities, we have identified several TEOs that have not refunded learners enrolled in study or training that is now covered by the Targeted Training and Apprenticeship (TTAF) fund.

As a reminder, TEOs that receive TTAF funding need to make fee refunds or process student loan reversals, where fees have already been paid for programmes that a TEO has now received TTAF funding for.

This diagram explains which fees are covered for programmes eligible from 1 July 2020. Further information on which fees are covered for programmes that are eligible from 1 January 2021 is available on the TEC website.

You can also see the amount of TTAF fees paid for each individual learner in both 2020 and 2021 in the new My Targeted Training and Apprenticeship app in Ngā Kete.

We recommend that any TEOs who have received TTAF funding review the learner breakdown in Ngā Kete to ensure appropriate refunds are being made to learners.

If you have any questions regarding TTAF start dates and refunds, please contact your relationship manager, relationship advisor or email customerservice@tec.govt.nz.