Grow your business with apprentices
Apprenticeships help you to grow your own talent, reduce staff turnover and give your business the skills it needs to succeed.
We’ll show you how apprenticeships can work for your business.
Whatever industry you work in, apprenticeships can deliver a range of benefits, such as:
- growing your business and solving recruitment challenges
- breeding creativity and enthusiasm with new talent, or retaining and upskilling current staff
- providing training that’s tailored to the needs and requirements of your business – learning can even be done in your workplace, minimising disruption and maximising impact
What’s the cost of training an apprentice?
An apprenticeship is a real job. Apprentices are your employees, but must spend 20% of their time in formal training – often provided in partnership with a training provider.
You can get government apprenticeship funding to cover some of the cost of training and assessing an apprentice. The amount of funding you can get will depend on whether or not you pay the apprenticeship levy and your apprentices’ circumstances.
For SMEs, the amount of funding you can get will depend on the size of your business and your apprentices’ circumstances:
- the government pays 90% of an SME’s training and assessment costs for the lifetime of the apprenticeship, any age, any level (up to funding band maximum)
- an extra £1,000 grant will be paid to any SME who takes on a 16 to 18 year old or 19 to 24 year old who has previously been in care
- businesses with under 50 staff will also see 100% of training and assessment costs paid for if they recruit an apprentice aged 16 to 18
- further support is also available for SMEs who take on those with additional learning needs
Other apprenticeship resources
Our four-step guide to hiring an apprentice.
Search for apprenticeship training by job role or keyword, and find training providers who offer the apprenticeship training you choose.
Everything you need to know about apprenticeships in one easy to print guide.
Federation of Small Businesses
Read the FSB’s guide to apprenticeship funding and other resources on their website.