Navigation: New Sidebar Layout
The main navigation in Bud will be moving from a top bar to a collapsible left-hand sidebar. We are targeting the release of this change to all users from the 19th May 2026, further communication will confirm this.
The sidebar can be expanded to display navigation labels or collapsed to show icons only, keeping more of the screen available for your work. All menu items, sub-menus, and their order are unchanged and all functionality remains the same.
For full details, including screenshots of the new layout to familiarise yourself with this change see the knowledge base article: here
No action is required. When you log in from 19th May 2026, you will see the new layout immediately.
Assessments
Following on from the last release, where we launched the capability to add Assessments in to Learners Plans, this release continues to build out that capability. This release adds:
- Assessments can now be moved into an In progress state, with an editable target due date.
- Employers now have visibility of their learners' Assessments.
- Assessment attempts can be created, so you can capture the detail of each attempt — including the time and specific location of the assessment.
- Assessment attempts can also be edited after they've been created.
To see more information on Assessments, and the overarching Flexible Learning theme, see this article. The assessments capability is behind a Feature Switch, so if you want to find out more and start utilising this, please speak to your Customer Success Manager.
ILR Specification changes for 26/27
We have started the process of making changes to the ILR as directed by the 25/26 ILR Specification Version 1. These changes are being released ahead of the new academic year starting on the 1st Aug 2026 as they are non-breaking changes. It is the responsibility of the training provider to ensure that fields marked as “Valid from 01/08/26” are not used before this date and fields marked “Valid to 31/07/26” are not used after this date for new enrolment as this will result in ILR validation errors.
The changes made so far are:
Added “Valid to 31/07/26” labels the following fields
- Funding Model 10 (Community Learning)
- Funding Model 35 – Adult Skills
Added
- New Funding Models
- 39 - Growth and Skills Short Course Offer (Valid from 01/08/26)
- Source of Funding codes:
- Hull and East Yorkshire Combined Authority (SOF 124)
- The Lancashire Combined County Authority (SOF 125)
- Greater Lincolnshire Combined County Authority (SOF 126)
- Devon and Torbay Combined County Authority (SOF 127)
- Buckinghamshire Council (SOF 128)
- Surrey County Council (SOF 129)
- Warwickshire County Council (SOF 130)
- Removed
- LLDD categories 1, 2 and 3 from the Learner LLDDCat field
- Employment Intensity Indicator (EII) codes 1–4 from the Learner Employment Status entity
- Extended
- Assessment Organisation ID maximum length from 7 to 8 characters.
More changes will be made in the next scheduled release and all changes will be documented in a forthcoming knowledgebase article.
Skills Bootcamp Code added
We have added the following Skills Bootcamp to the selection options when creating a Skills Bootcamp Programme:
Z0060506 - Digital Business Services - Level 4 equivalent
Bug Fixes
In this release we have fixed the following bugs:
- Removed ability to withdraw learners directly from End-Point Assessment (EPA) - We have removed the ability to withdraw learners directly once they are in a status of “In End Point Assessment”. A learner will need to moved back into an “in Progress” state before they can be withdrawn.
- Images not being stored correctly if included in a heading (Within a rich text editor) - We have resolved an issue where images paced directly into the header section of any Rich text editor (i.e. Free text box with formatting options) would result in issues with the saving of activities and potentially the saving of programmes.
- Incorrect activity propagation - Some activities were incorrectly propagating following the editing of a live programme or changes in the Activity Library. This has now been resolved and activities will propagate following the rules stated in this article: here
- Broken Activity linked in the Learners ‘My Progress’ record - We have resolved an issue, where Learners accessing the new ‘My Progress’ record couldn’t access activities that had criteria linked to other qualifications.
Business Intelligence Release - 13th May 2026 @ 3:45pm
ILR Compliance Reports - PDSATs
Since the last release we have been making iterative improvements to the PDSAT reports available in our ILR Compliance Suite.
The reports now contain 18 of the most impactful PDSATS voted for by our customers to help you get a pro-active grasp on potential issues before ILR submission. These reports can be used to support ongoing monitoring and early identification of possible errors, inconsistencies and funding risks based on the logic for PDSAT reports. As with our ILR Validation rules and FRMs these PDSATS should be used as a tool to assist data cleanliness in your ILR only and DfE produced report should always be used as the final check.
PDSAT Reports now available are:
QAR Updates
In this release the 24/25 QAR dataset from the DfE has been added to the QAR reports.
Final published data from the DfE is now available in the DfE data sets page of this report allowing you to compare your provision year on year as well as see where you stand in the Providers league table
Learner Insights
In this release we have made some adjustments, detailed below, to the learner scoring observations available on a learning plan.
Observations will now only generate when start month is reached to avoid skewing issues and warnings before learning commences.
Adjustment to the wording when a learner is past their planned end date but their learning appears to be completed.
Adjustment to active learning bands, where a learner is 21 days through the expected month with no active learning, a warning will now present to drive action.