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Yorkshire and Humber
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Study Leave
for Postgraduate Doctors and Dentists in Training

This page provides step-by-step instructions for submitting an application on Accent Leave Manager and other user tasks. Please also refer to the Overview of Study Leave and the Frequently Asked Questions for more information and help. Please ensure that you read the relevant information on the website before contacting the NHSE study leave team.

ALM Trust User Guide

Policy and guidance

The NHS England approach to study leave is set out in the  national study leave policy, which provides a strategic overview of the study leave process, approval principles and finance management. The policy was developed by the Study Leave Working Group with trainee representatives.

The Yorkshire and the Humber study leave operational guidance sets out our local NHSE study leave guidance and covers the process for applications and claiming expenses.

Approvers are strongly encouraged to familiarise themselves with the policy and guidance documents and also refer to them when reviewing study leave applications.

Approval process

Before submitting a study leave application on Accent Leave Manager, applicants must secure Rota Coordinator agreement for the time off and Educational Supervisor support for the educational appropriateness of the course/conference. Rota Coordinator agreement must be requested 8 weeks before the event using the local trust e-roster / process. Educational Supervisor support should be discussed as part of PDP planning and documented in the applicant's e-portfolio.

Once Rota Coordinator and Educational Supervisor support have been confirmed, a Study Leave application may be submitted on ALM for final Training Programme Director approval. Alternatively, where a course/conference is pre-approved by the PGMDE school, the application will be routed to Medical Education for approval.

Study leave applications must be submitted on ALM in advance of the course/conference and applicants should wait for approval before making any payments. If an applicant chooses to pay for a course/conference prior to requesting or receiving approval, they risk incurring costs which may not be reimbursed. Retrospective applications may considered if there is an exceptional reason and the application is received within 6 weeks of the event. Applications received outside of 6 weeks of the event would not normally be considered.

Image shows the study leave approval stages. Before the event: The applicant requests Educational Supervisor support, and Rota Coordinator agreement for the time off, and then submits an ALM application for TPD approval. After the event: The applicant submits an expense claim using the employing trust e-expenses, the claim is then authorised by Medical Education for payment via the applicant's monthly salary.

Final expense claims are submitted after the event using the employing trust's e-expenses or process and are authorised by Medical Education. Expense claims must be submitted within 6 weeks of the event. Claims must be accompanied by receipts and evidence of attendance. Claims will only be reimbursed in line with the nationally agreed rates for subsistence and travel. Late claims submitted within 3 months of the event may be considered if there is an exceptional reason. Claims received outside 3 months of the event will not be considered.

Regional Teaching and pre-approved courses

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How to activate your account

ALM accounts are created automatically, and you should receive an activation email 8 weeks before your programme start date or previously when ALM launched. The account activation email is sent to the email address recorded for you in the NHSE Trainee Information System (TIS). Your ALM username is the email address in your TIS record.

To activate your account, please follow the instructions in the account activation email or use the Forgotten Password link on the ALM login page to request a password reset. There may be a delay before receiving the password reset email. Please check your junk/spam folder and consider adding NoReply@hicom.co.uk to your safe senders list.

To check or update the email address in your TIS record, please contact the relevant team below:

Please note: When contacting any of the teams above, please state clearly that you wish to check or change the email address in your TIS record; as they are not able to help with Accent Leave Manager itself. If you change the email address in your TIS record, your ALM username will update overnight to match the new email address.

Please note: Some email providers sometimes block emails from NHSE / ALM. Where possible, we recommend that doctors & dentists in training provide us with their nhs.net email address.

How to reset your password

To change your ALM password, please use the Forgotten Password link on the ALM login page. There may be a delay before receiving the password reset email. Please check your junk/spam folder and consider adding NoReply@hicom.co.uk to your safe senders list.

if you do not receive the password reset email, you may need to check the email address recorded for you in the NHSE Trainee Information System (TIS) - see above.

How to navigate the site

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Navigation menu

  • Applications, Expenses
  • Batch replace approvers
  • Out of office
  • Messages

Maintained by NHSE

  • Entitlements / Budgets
  • Approval chains
  • Non-administrators
  • Events

How to navigate the dashboards

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  • All Applications
  • All Expenses
  • Export to Excel

How to read application forms

To create a new application on ALM, go to the Navigation Menu and click Leave Application.

Please note: ALM is not optimised for mobile browsers and some essential sections of the application screens do not function on mobile devices. Please ensure that you access ALM using a computer and either the Chrome, Edge, Safari, or Firefox browser.

Leave details

To view the status of an application, go to Navigation Menu > My Applications. Leave application status is displayed in the My Applications list. For more information, click and open the relevant application. 

The application status appears in the top right corner of the application (see 1 above). The Application ID also appears in the Leave Details section at the top of the page. If you need to contact us about a particular application, please quote the Application ID. This helps us to find the right application.

Begin by entering the initial leave details and checking the placement information displayed:

  1. Enter a start and end date. If the dates span two placements, two applications will normally be needed.
  2. Check the number of days. This can be adjusted, eg to reflect half-day courses or if the activity is taking place outside of work time and you do not intend to claim TOIL.
  3. Check the placement details that appear. If the details are incorrect or an error message appears instead of your placement, please see the Study Leave FAQs for help.
  4. Select the leave type. Please ensure you select the appropriate leave type. See below for descriptions of the different leave types.
  5. Click save to save your application and move to the next page.

Study Leave Types

Study - All curriculum or discretionary courses / conferences / activity not covered by one of the other leave types below.
Exam - Exam preparation courses and exam sittings. Please note: Exam fees may not be funded through study leave. 
Private - Home based revision / exam preparation before an exam sitting. Expenses may not be claimed for private study leave. 
International - Courses / conferences taking place outside of the UK. This includes online/virtual events.

Event details

On the next page, enter the details for the course / conference for which you are applying:

  1. If the name of your course / conference appears in the event list select it here. The list will include courses typically approved for your grade / curriculum, as well as Regional Teaching (see below for a definition of Regional Teaching). Only select from the event list if you are confident that the selection correctly matches the course / conference for which you are applying. Applications where the event details have been completed incorrectly will be rejected.

Or, if your course / conference does not appear in the event list, toggle 'My event does not appear in the list above' and free type the event name, as below:

  1. Enter the course reference, venue, provider and a website link for the course / conference. Please avoid abbreviations.

  • Course reference (Optional): Normally the course code used by the provider. If you selected regional teaching above, enter the session name here.

  • Venue (Mandatory): The venue where the activity is taking place. For virtual course/conferences enter ‘online event’ or ‘online self-paced course’ as applicable.

  • Provider (Mandatory): The name of the organisation or company providing the course.

  • Website: Enter a link to the event webpage where the approver can find more information about the course / conference, including the course / conference fees. While website link is optional, the approver may need to contact you for more information if a link is not included.

  1. Document upload can be used to provide additional information for your approver. Receipts are not required at the time of application, unless you need to evidence the cost of the course / conference fee. Other documents that may be relevant include, for example, evidence of conference poster / speaking invitation. Some schools may require a brief supporting statement, that can be attached using the document upload. 

Regional Teaching

Regional Teaching is a study / clinical skills day organised by your training programme, or a school conference. As a general rule, regional teaching does not have a course / conference fee. Please only select regional teaching if the course / conference is organised by your training programme or specialty school. For all external course / conferences please either select the specific event from the list or enter the event name in the free text box below.

Entitlements and budget

ALM will display a summary of your study leave entitlement and budget on the application screen. Entitlements and budgets are calculated based on the financial (rather than academic) year and are imported by the Study Leave admin team.

Entitlement refers to the number of study leave days allocated to doctors and dentists in training. Your entitlement includes mandatory and regional teaching study days.

Budget refers to the costs of your study leave applications to date. On ALM your budget amount/remaining budget reads ‘unlimited’, but it is important to note that while individual study leave caps no longer apply, the overall study budget is finite. All applications are evaluated based on their educational appropriateness, quality and value for money.

If you see an error message ‘No entitlements/budgets found for selected data’, please see the Study Leave FAQs.

Cover and authorisation

Next enter the details regarding local approval for your planned study leave:

  1. Supervisor and Rota Manager (Coordinator): Enter the name of the relevant Supervisor and Rota Coordinator who have locally approved your planned study leave.
  2. Comments (optional): For relevant notes regarding local ES / Rota approval if needed. Do not use this section for other additional comments re the course/conference.
  3. Declaration: The declarartion must only be completed if your Supervisor and Rota Coordinator approval has been received. If you are still waiting for Supervisor and or Rota Coordinator approval, please save your application as a draft and continue when they have confirmed.
Please note: Where an application has been submitted but Rota Coordinator approval has not been received, the trust may decline to release the applicant for the course/conference. Late or retrospective leave requests are considered at the discretion of the trust.
Estimated expenses

If you intend to claim expenses, estimated expenses must be added to your application before it is submitted. Expense claims submitted after the event will only be processed if estimated expenses were added at the time of application and the application was approved.

To add an estimated expense, click Add in the Expenses section and follow the instructions below. Each expense must be added seperately by type. Unclear or incorrectly entered expenses may result in your application or expense claim being rejected.

  1. Enter the expense type and estimate cost. If the expense is for accomodation, also enter the number of nights.
  2. Add brief comments to explain/justify the expense: eg milage calculation or ticket type
  3. Expense files uploads are optional and receipts are not required at the time of application
  4. Then click save to save the expense item and return to your application
Study Leave Allowances

Estimated expenses must be added within the allowances and expenses will only be reimbursed after the event in line with the nationally agreed rates.

Accommodation (if required): Upto £120 per night outside London and upto £150 within London for single occupancy only. Where shared occupancy is required, only 50% of the costs will be refunded.
Milage: 30p per mile, when travelling in own car and calculated using the most direct route between base hospital and destination.
Public transport: Only standard class tickets may be reimbursed. Applicants should select the cheapest ticket options available.
Meals: Upto £5 lunch allowance. Upto £15 evening meal allowance where overnight accommodation is required.

Please note: Conference dinners and social events may not be reimbursed under meal expenses or with the conference fees. Membership fees paid when booking course / conferences are also not eligible for reimbusement.

Unless otherwise stated, study leave allowances reflect the NHS Terms & Conditions of Service.

Approval Chain

More information about an application can be found in the Approval Chain section at the bottom of the page. The Approval Chain section lists the TPD and Medical Education approvers linked to the application. The following symbols help to indicate the approver / application status:

 Outstanding - Indicates active approver(s) who can approve or reject the application.

 Bypassed - Indicates bypassed approvers. Bypassed approvers can view the application but cannot approve or reject it.

 Pending - Indicates the next approvers in the chain. The application status for requests that are waiting an outcome is also shown as pending.

 Approved - Indicates that the application has been approved by the named approver. Please note: Some applications require more than one approver, so it is important to check the next sequence and the overall application status at the top of the page.

 Rejected - Indicates that the application has been rejected by the named approver. If an approver rejects an application, the application status will also change to rejected.

 Cancelled - Appears in the application status only and indicates that the application has been cancelled.

Sequence 20 in the approval chain typically refers to TPD approvers. Sequence 30 typically refers to Medical Education approvers. Other approvers who may be linked to an application include Heads of School and the NHSE Study Leave team. Most applications require only one approver but some applications require more than one approver. As noted above, it is essential to check the overall application status.

How to add an approver

To view your notifications and messages in ALM, go to the Navigation Menu and click Message. You can also click the messages icon in the top right corner. 

System notifications are sent when an application is approved, rejected or cancelled. You can use the buttons at the top of the list to mark messages as read or delete them. Read and deleted messages can be found in the Read and Deleted tabs.

Please note: System notifications are also sent by email. However, some email providers block emails from ALM. Please check your junk/spam folder regularly and consider adding NoReply@hicom.co.uk to your safe senders list.

How to replace an approver

To view your previous applications go to the Navigation Menu and click My Applications. All your draft and submitted applications will appear in your My Applications list.

Applications can be filtered or sorted by type, date, application status and other fields. If you wish to delete a draft, click the relevant checkbox and then click delete. Submitted applications cannot be deleted but if appropriate can be cancelled (see below).

How to cancel an application

 

If you need to cancel an application, you can do so before the date of course / conference. To cancel an application:

  1. Go to My Applications in the Navigation Menu,
  2. Click on the relevant application to open it
  3. Scroll to the bottom of the page
  4. and then click Cancel Application 

If the course / conference date has passed, you will need to email Medical Education at your employing trust to ask them to cancel the application on your behalf.Please note: Cancelled applications cannot be reinstated, so please be certain that you need to cancel your application before submitting the request.

How to action an application

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How to record expenses

While study leave applications are now submitted using ALM, reimbursement continues to be through the local trust expenses system. Expense systems vary depending on the employing trust, please contact Medical Education at your employing trust for information about or assistance using the trust expenses system. 

Please note: Expense claims may only be submitted after the course / conference and must be submitted within 6 weeks of the event. Late claims are considered at the discretion of the trust. Evidence of attendance and receipts must be included with expense claims.

Expense allowances

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International Study Leave

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How to set an out office on behalf of an approver

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How to request support

For help using ALM or claiming expenses, please contact the Medical Education at your employing trust. For technical support, feedback or guidance, please contact the NHSE Study Leave team. Please see the Overview of Study Leave page for the list of support contacts.

When emailing for support, please ensure that you include your GMC Number, and the start/end dates and course / conference name for your planned study leave. If you are emailing about a system error, please include the text of the error message and or a screenshot. Please also include the date and time that you encountered the error.

 

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