Best accounting and financial management software for schools and MATs: what to look for

The short answer: you need accounting software if your priority is recording and reporting day-to-day finances, and you need a full financial management solution if you also need to plan and forecast ahead. Most schools need accounting software as a baseline; whether you need more depends on how complex your planning is. 

School accounting software handles the financial fundamentals: recording income and expenditure, bank reconciliation, purchase orders, invoicing, and producing DfE statutory returns (CFR for maintained schools, AAR for academies). Education-specific accounting software has DfE compliance built in, which is why generic tools like Xero or QuickBooks are rarely the best fit: they are not built to produce the CFR or AAR returns that state schools and trusts have to submit. The main education-specific options for UK state schools are Access Education Finance, Sage for Education, XfE (Xero for Education) and IMP Finance. 

A full financial management solution adds budget planning, forecasting and scenario modelling on top of the accounting layer. You are likely to need it if you plan across multiple years, model staffing costs, or manage finances across several academies. If none of those apply, accounting software on its own may be all you need. As one useful test: accounting software answers "where is our money now?", while financial management also answers, "are we on track against where we planned to be?" 

There is no single best system, only the best fit for what your school or trust actually needs, and that depends on whether you need accounting alone or the fuller financial management picture, and whether you are a single school or a trust. 

The main things to look for are DfE Chart of Accounts adoption, Annual Return automation, MAT consolidation reporting, budget planning integration, HR and payroll integration, education-sector expertise, and total cost of ownership. Not all of these will matter equally to every school, so focus on the ones that reflect your setting. 

DfE Chart of Accounts (CoA) adoption 

The DfE Chart of Accounts is a standardised structure for recording and reporting financial transactions across academy trusts, enabling consistent comparison and oversight. Trusts are expected to adopt it. Ask any provider how well their software supports CoA, and whether their customers are typically able to adopt it without manual workarounds. 

Annual Return automation 

The DfE expects trusts to automate their Annual Return submission, which saves significant time and reduces errors. Ask any provider what percentage of their clients currently submit via automation. Most have not yet enabled this at scale, so it is worth asking directly. 

MAT consolidation reporting 

For multi-academy trusts, the ability to produce consolidated reports across all schools, while letting individual academies manage their own ledgers, is essential. Ask how the system handles inter-academy transactions, top-down visibility and trust-level reporting. Not all systems handle this without manual workarounds. 

Budget planning and forecasting 

If you need to plan ahead as well as record what has happened, check whether an accounting system connects with a budget planning tool for five-year forecasting, salary modelling and scenario planning. For how to build this into your process, see our guide to school budget planning. 

Integration with HR, payroll and purchasing 

Staff costs are typically 70 to 80% of a school's budget, so a finance system that connects to your HR and payroll removes manual reconciliation that wastes time and causes errors. Ask any provider which HR and payroll systems they connect with, and whether the integration is built in or relies on a third-party connector. It is also worth asking whether you have to buy everything from one provider to get that integration, or whether their finance software connects with tools you already use. When evaluating Access Education Finance for example, it is worth understanding that it sits within Access Evo, the platform connecting Access Education's products, so finance, budgeting, HR, payroll and purchasing work together under a single login rather than as separate systems you move data between. 

Education-sector expertise and support 

General accounting software leaves gaps in compliance functionality and support. Education-specific providers understand CFR, AAR, SFVS and the Academy Trust Handbook. When evaluating, ask whether the support team specialises in education or also supports general business customers. 

Total cost of ownership 

Include implementation, training, data migration and ongoing support in any cost comparison, not just the annual licence fee. Schools sometimes underestimate switching costs, particularly for migrating historical financial data. If you are weighing up a change, our guide to switching finance software for schools and MATs walks through what the process actually involves. 

The ‘best’ software is always based on the most suitable fit for your specific situation. The four questions below can steer you in the right direction, and they are worth answering before you speak to any provider. 

Are you state-funded? If you are a maintained school, academy or trust, education-specific software with DfE compliance built in is the baseline, not an optional extra. This alone rules out most generic accounting tools. 

Are you one school or a trust? A single school can often work well with straightforward accounting and reporting. A trust needs consolidation and the ability to manage finances at both school and trust level, and the more schools you run, the more that matters. 

Do you need to plan ahead, or just record what has been spent? If you forecast, model staffing costs or plan across several years, you need budget planning alongside your accounting software. If you don't, accounting on its own may be all you need. 

What does your budget for software really need to cover? Look beyond the annual licence fee to implementation, training, data migration and ongoing support. This is where the true cost of a change sits. 

Before choosing finance software, it helps to speak to your auditor, talk to peers who have recently switched, audit your current setup, and agree a review cycle with governors or trustees. Taking these steps first makes the actual evaluation quicker and more reliable. 

Speak to your auditor or finance adviser. They work across multiple schools and providers and can tell you about Chart of Accounts migration readiness, automation capability, and where they see schools and trusts running into difficulty.  

Speak to peers. Other schools and trusts who have recently changed system will tell you what the process was actually like: what went smoothly, what caught them out, and whether the provider delivered what was promised. It is the kind of honest detail you won't get from a sales demo. 

Audit your existing setup. Identify the pain points that are prompting the change, work out what data would need migrating, and note what currently works well, so you don't lose something useful in the move.  

Agree a review cycle with your governors or trustees. Decide how often you will review your finance software, so it doesn't get overlooked until it becomes a problem.

Once you have a shortlist, a handful of direct questions will tell you more than any brochure. Ask every provider: whether they support DfE Annual Return automation, their Chart of Accounts migration support and adoption rate, whether they will migrate your existing records, their realistic implementation timeline, their contract and exit terms, and what similar schools say about them. In full: 

• Does your system support DfE automation of the Annual Return? 
• Do you support migration to the Academies Chart of Accounts, and what is your current client adoption rate? 
• Will you migrate our previous financial records into the new system? 
• What is the realistic implementation timeline for an organisation of our size? 
• What do the contract length and exit process look like? 
• What do other schools or trusts like ours say about their experience with you? 

These are adapted from the DfE's own guidance on choosing financial software.

This guide covers what to look for and which type of school or trust each option suits. For a data-led comparison of the main providers, using DfE Academies Accounts Return 2024/25 data, see our comparison of accounting software for schools, academies and MATs. The DfE also publishes its own independent FMS comparison matrix, listing all providers and their automation capabilities.

If you are ready to talk through your school or trust's requirements, get a quote and we will advise on the most suitable approach, whether that is accounting software alone or the wider financial management picture. 

Access Education Finance sits within Access Evo, the platform connecting Access Education's products, so finance, budgeting, HR, payroll and purchasing work together under a single login rather than as separate systems you move data between. It also brings in capabilities like Evo Researcher, which lets you ask questions of your finance data in everyday language and get answers drawn from live information, and Evo Navigator, which surfaces the tasks and priorities that need your attention when you log in. The value is less about any single feature and more about spending less time compiling information and more time acting on it.