Source · National Audit Office

Financial management of fees and charges

This report considers how effectively government bodies financially manage fees and charges for certain services.

Published: 20 Jun 2025 Recommendations: 6 Type: Value for Money NAO confirmed: 6 Department: HM Treasury
Dept: HM Treasury Topics: Commercial and financial managementMoney and taxTax and revenue nao.org.uk →

Recommendations

6 items
5 accepted 1 partially accepted 1 implemented 5 in progress

Recommendation 1

Addressee: HM Treasury · Source location: Page 11, paragraph 21, point a, first bullet point.

HM Treasury should:
a) ensure that disclosure requirements are aligned between Managing Public Money and the Financial Reporting Manual, and that the requirements support transparency and accountability while being proportionate in their level of detail relative to their risk to public money;

Response position: Accepted

Delivery: Implemented · Q2 2026-27 · Confirmed by NAO

Recommendation 2

Addressee: HM Treasury · Source location: Page 11, paragraph 21, point b, second bullet point.

HM Treasury should:
b) extend its guidance in chapter six of Managing Public Money to include: a template to standardise the process of proposing or amending fees and charges; additional support on data collection, strategic decision-making, and monitoring; and the relative merits of alternative approaches where appropriate;

Response position: Partially accepted

Delivery: In progress · Q2 2026-27 · Confirmed by NAO

Recommendation 3

Addressee: HM Treasury · Source location: Page 11, paragraph 21, point c, third bullet point.

HM Treasury should:
c) determine how incentives and levers can be used to encourage greater efficiencies or quality improvements, especially where there may be opportunities to transform customer service or invest to save;

Response position: Accepted

Delivery: In progress · Q2 2026-27 · Confirmed by NAO

Recommendation 4

Addressee: HM Treasury · Source location: Page 11, paragraph 21, point d, fourth bullet point.

HM Treasury should:
d) assess options, including legislative approaches, to streamline and make more flexible the fee amendment process to better support government bodies in their financial management of fees and charges; and

Response position: Accepted

Delivery: In progress · Q2 2026-27 · Confirmed by NAO

Recommendation 5

Addressee: HM Treasury · Source location: Page 11, paragraph 21, point e, fifth bullet point.

HM Treasury should:
e) set out what action it will take to better support good financial management of fees and charges across government with good practice, tools, guidance and examples on issues like navigating trade-offs and addressing data limitations

Response position: Accepted

Delivery: In progress · Q2 2026-27 · Confirmed by NAO

Recommendation 6

Addressee: HM Treasury · Source location: Page 11, 20

Accounting Officers should proactively monitor whether charged services are recovering costs, and act where they persistently deliver unplanned surpluses or deficits, or fail to comply with the principles of Managing Public Money. This should include ensuring they have the appropriate legislative and Treasury approvals for their approach so that the regularity of the expenditure can be effectively audited and transparently presented to Parliament.

Response position: Accepted

Delivery: In progress · Q2 2026-27 · Confirmed by NAO