A total of £1.86m of capacity and access funding was not granted to PCNs in 2024/25, according to an investigation.
A freedom of information (FOI) request sent to all 42 ICBs by our sister title Pulse PCN has revealed that at least 49 PCNs did not receive the full payment.
Capacity and access payments (CAP) are split into two components. The capacity and access support payment (CASP), which was worth £204m in 2024/25, is given unconditionally to PCNs. This makes up 70% of the total available funding for CAP and was received by all PCNs.
A second payment, called the capacity and access improvement payment (CAIP), is conditional and is worth £88m in total. It is given out based on the progress made implementing the modern general practice access model, that stipulates that PCN practices should have: better digital telephony; simpler online requests; and faster navigation, assessment and response. The maximum a PCN can earn is £1.392 multiplied by the PCN’s adjusted population as of 1 January 2024.
The FOI investigation found that there was £1.86m not granted to PCNs across England for CAIP.
In May, it was revealed that 87% of PCNs had achieved the full CAP payment across 2024/25, however the full details of that were not known.
In the FOI request, also sent in May, ICBs were asked to state whether there were unallocated CAIP funds for 202/25.
A total of 31 ICBs responded to this question – with 13 ICBs revealing that between them £1,860,164 was unallocated during the year. See table below.
| ICB | CAIP funding not allocated for 2024/25 |
| Bath and North East Somerset | £0 |
| Birmingham and Solihull | £112,458 |
| Black Country | £0 |
| Bristol, North Somerset and South Gloucestershire | £0 |
| Cambridgeshire and Peterborough | £0 |
| Cheshire and Merseyside | £0 |
| Cornwall and Isles of Scilly | £0 |
| Coventry and Warwickshire | £0 |
| Devon | £238,734 |
| Dorset | £0 |
| Frimley | £0 |
| Gloucestershire | £25,644 |
| Greater Manchester | £441,256 |
| Hampshire and Isle of Wight | £378,252 |
| Herefordshire and Worcestershire | £0 |
| Humber and North Yorkshire | £2,417 |
| Kent and Medway | £40,000 |
| Lancashire and South Cumbria | £37,821 |
| Leicester, Leicestershire and Rutland | £0 |
| Lincolnshire | £27,031 |
| Mid and South Essex | £369,141 |
| Norfolk and Waveney | £38,597 |
| North Central London | £0 |
| Northamptonshire | £0 |
| Nottingham and Nottinghamshire | £0 |
| Shropshire, Telford and Wrekin | £65,814 |
| South Yorkshire | £0 |
| Staffordshire and Stoke-on-Trent | £0 |
| Suffolk and North East Essex | £83,000 |
| Surrey Heartlands | £0 |
| Sussex | £0 |
| Total unspent | £1,860,164 |
In a separate question, ICBs were also asked to provide data on how many of their PCNs did not receive 100% of CAIP funding and what targets were missed.
A total of 22 ICBs provided a full breakdown in response, with results showing that there were at least 49 PCNs across 11 ICBs that didn’t receive the full CAIP entitlement. This equated to £1.4m of lost money though is likely to be more since one ICB, Hertfordshire and West Essex, did not provide a monetary figure.
These FOI results also showed that:
- Of the 22 ICBs that responded with full data, Hampshire and the Isle of Wight ICB had the highest number of PCNs that did not receive the full amount of funding via the CAIP scheme – 16.
- Greater Manchester had 13 PCNs that didnt receive full CAIP funding and Devon ICB reported six PCNs as missing out.
- A further five ICBs reported that between them they had 23 PCNs that didn’t receive the full CAIP funding. However, there was no data given on actual amounts.
James Roach, director of primary care and local care at NHS Hampshire and Isle of Wight said: ‘We are continuing to work with all PCNs across Hampshire and the Isle of Wight to ensure they are able to receive ongoing support through programmes like the Capacity and Access Improvement Payment (CAIP) in addition to the locally developed and delivered Primary Care Resilience Scheme.
‘We have developed and launched a programme of wider resilience and innovation support of which CAIP continues to play a key part.’
William Guy, director of primary care at NHS Mid and South Essex, which had £369,141 unallocated to PCNs, said: ‘Since the publication of the Primary Care Access Recovery Plan, the ICB has invested in a range of tools and support programmes for local practices. In addition, we have established our “Connected Pathways” Team who work with practices and PCNs to support the implementation of Modern General Practice.
‘All PCNs were actively encouraged and supported to achieve full CAIP, but ultimately they needed to demonstrate compliance with the Network DES requirements in order to qualify for payment. The ICB remains committed to supporting practices with these developments.’
NHS England has been approached for comment.
A version of this article was first published by our sister title Pulse PCN
