Jet2 has revealed plans to give away up to £500,000 worth of unused Apprenticeship Levy funding to agents and charities.
As part of a newly-launched Appoint An Apprentice scheme, the company is writing to eligible trade and charity partners to invite them to apply for a slice of its leftover government funds to pay for apprenticeships within their own businesses.
It is the first time that Jet2, which employs 15,000 staff within Jet2.com and Jet2holidays, has donated remaining levy funds.
Under the government scheme, which applies to firms in England, up to 25% of a company’s levy funding can be donated to other companies.
The move follows claims billions in levy funds nationwide have gone unused and been lost under the government’s ‘use-it-or-lose-it’ scheme.
Jet2 has more than 150 apprentices, of which 50 are staff on courses to support their development up to Level 7 senior leader, equivalent to a Master’s degree qualification.
The company, which has 2,500 trade partners, said by sharing its levy funds it hoped to help smaller businesses by saving them money and allowing them to invest further in developing talent.
Human resources director Miriam D’souli said: “We will probably not use up all of our levy and in the past this has been forfeited. We thought, why don’t we support our trade and charity partners to attract and develop their people?”
She said some travel agents may have run out of funding and benefit from additional funds to train new or existing staff, adding: “We want to help our trade partners. They don’t have the same funding as us. Some may have used all of their funds up.”
She said it made sense to help agency partners develop their staff, particularly as many consultants progress to roles within Jet2 or other parts of the industry.
“It’s in our interests; a lot of people land up with us. It’s about supporting each other. We are really excited about it,” she said, adding that apprenticeship levy funds could be used by staff at all levels of the business, from travel consultants to managing directors, for training and career development.
Katie Rankin, Jet2’s emerging talent and careers manager, added: “At Jet2 we have worked hard to ensure we are using our levy rather than losing it, however we are also conscious that due to the size of our Paye bill this fund is growing and we therefore want to use it as a force for good within industry through the Jet2holidays Appoint an Apprentice levy share scheme as well as supporting our charity partners who are aligned to our Net Zero Sustainability Strategy or are voted for by our colleagues.”