Register of Certified Officers (RCO)
REGISTER OF CERTIFYING OFFICERS (RCO)
This form is required to record each officer who has authorisation to sign for and commit the school. The responsibility for maintaining up to date records lies with the Headteacher.
Changes
Any change in personnel or financial limits must be notified to the Schools Finance Team at Shute End as soon as possible after the change takes effect.
Review of RCO
The names and limits on this register should be reviewed regularly, ideally annually when setting the School Financial Value Standard (SFVS) and school Financial Policies. The form does not have to be re-signed by all signatories each year – the review should however be minuted at Finance Committee or Full Governing Body, and the form should be formally approved, signed by the Chair of Governors and dated accordingly.
Approval limits
The Headteacher should have an approval level sufficiently high to manage all day to day running of the school, but for other members of staff the school may choose to set graduated limits as appropriate within the staff structure.
The Chair of Governors should not be a Certifying Officer. The reasons for this are twofold:
- The Governing Body should have strategic oversight only, as their duty is to hold the school to account in relation to ensuring value for money and monitoring the budget. The Chair of Governors does not have any operational responsibilities and as such should not be included in the Register of Certifying Officers.
- The Chair of Governors is the person signing off the RCO, so if they are included as a Certifying Officer then the fundamental internal control of separation of duties fails.
For any very significant projects or expense items, due process should be followed as regards putting the project out to tender. The preferred tender would then be presented to governors for discussion and approval. Once approved this decision would be recorded in FGB minutes which would be signed off by the CoG. A purchase order would then be raised for the agreed spend, supported by the signed minutes. This would then mean the Headteacher could sign off invoices relating to this specific Purchase Order, even if they were above his/her normal authority level, as long as the invoices were supported by the appropriate signed minutes.