Request

You asked us:

[Q1] What information does the NHSBSA pass onto NHS England regarding payment of administering covid vaccines by GP practices and PCN's?

[Q2] How is such information transferred, i.e., do you send invoices by email or is information transferred using in-house systems? If the latter, please provide names of software or systems

You subsequently provided the following responses to clarifications:

Q: Does this question relate only to the information sent in order to arrange payments for administering covid vaccines?

A: YES - only related to payments for administering covid vaccines

Q: Do you require the monthly reports sent following the processing?

A: NO

Q: Do you require every report ever sent to NHSE for any purpose - including discontinued regular reports and ad-hoc queries?

A: NO

The NHS Business Services Authority (NHSBSA) received your request on 8 November 2024.

We have handled your request under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) 2000.

Our response

I can confirm that the NHSBSA holds the information you have requested.

Question 1

NHSBSA calculates the fees for administering Covid vaccinations as set out in the NHS England service specification; this is the most recent version at the time of writing:

https://www.england.nhs.uk/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/PRN00997i-gp-covid-19-es-specification-1-sept-2024-31-march-2026.pdf

I will refer to this document as 'The Service Specification' in the rest of this answer.

The calculation includes any "per item" or "per dose" payments that are applicable as described in paragraph 14.1 in The Service Specification. NHSBSA calculates the total of those payments for each Primary Care Network (PCN) Grouping represented by a single GP Practice as described in section 14.5 in The Service Specification. This is based on the declarations or claims that they have made using the NHSBSA 'Manage Your Service' system and in accordance with any other applicable clauses in the enhanced service specification document.

NHSBSA prepares a single comma separated values text file containing Covid payments that includes one line for each GP practice that is due a Covid vaccination payment that month. Each 'line' includes four pieces of information:

• the GP practice NHS Organisation Data Service (ODS) code
• the total payment that was calculated in pounds.
• the month in which the payment calculation was made.
• the month, or, list of months when the vaccinations were dispensed.

Information about the claims made by GPs for covid vaccination fees is available on our website from previous FOI requests. These responses represent the data in the payment files that NHSBSA produce. For example, FOI-02264 gives the data relating to GP practices and PCNs based on the claim / processing month:

https://opendata.nhsbsa.net/dataset/foi-02264

Question 2

The payment file is sent by secure electronic mail to NHS England to approve and then to Primary Care Services England.

This occurs once per month, following a monthly 'cut-off' date for claims; usually the 5th of each month - see 14.3 in The Service Specification.

Data Queries

Please contact foirequests@nhsbsa.nhs.uk ensuring you quote the above reference if you have any specific questions regarding this response; or, if you feel you may be misunderstanding or misinterpreting the information; or, if you plan on publishing the data.

Reusing the data and copyright

If you plan on producing a press or broadcast story based upon the data please contact communicationsteam@nhsbsa.nhs.uk. This is important to ensure that the figures are not misunderstood or misrepresented.

The information supplied to you continues to be protected by the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 and is subject to NHSBSA copyright. This information is licenced under the terms of the Open Government Licence detailed at:

http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/doc/open-government-licence/version/3/

Should you wish to re-use the information you must include the following statement: “NHSBSA Copyright 2024” Failure to do so is a breach of the terms of the licence.

Information you receive which is not subject to NHSBSA Copyright continues to be protected by the copyright of the person, or organisation, from which the information originated. Please obtain their permission before reproducing any third party (non NHSBSA Copyright) information.