Clinical Costing Standards

These clinical costing standards set out recommended best practice for the production of clinical costs and will support the production of patient level costs in acute and mental health organisations. The standards aim to support a robust and consistent approach to costing across the NHS. The 2013/14 version of the acute clinical costing standards are included within Monitor’s “Approved costing guidance”. They are to be followed by those organisations participating in the pilot patient level cost collection in 2013. The standards recognise a shared belief by the HFMA, Monitor and the Department of Health that the finance profession should have the lead role in setting standards and promoting the highest quality in costing practice. If you require previous versions of the standards please click here.

	Acute Health Clinical Costing Standards 2013/14 The acute standards have been further revised to improve consistency and clarity. This document is only available for download. The changes for 2013/14 build on feedback from a survey of costing leads and have been fully debated and discussed with the HFMA acute costing practitioner group. Key changes include a new standard on work in progress (standard 5), a standard on data matching (standard 8A), changes to cost pool groups (standard 2), a review of the classification of indirect and overhead costs and a comprehensive revision of the MAQS template and scoring system. » Download PDF
	Materiality and quality score (MAQS) template - Acute (April 2013) Standard 9 in the clinical costing standards sets out a methodology for organisations to measure the materiality and quality of their costing systems and processes. This spread sheet provides a template for organisations to calculate their own MAQ score. (Please note included financial figures are indicative only and should be deleted before use.) This template is based on an acute model of healthcare. Please see below for details of the MAQS for mental health organisations. » Download XLS
	Mental Health Clinical Costing Standards 2013/14 This document is only available for download. This update to the standards includes relevant changes to the acute standards – around classification of indirect and overhead costs, treatment of non patient care activities – and further refines the cost pool groups set out in standard 2. A MAQS template for mental health organisations has been developed with the support of the HFMA Mental Health Costing Special Interest Group. Further work on the standards will be taken forward during 2013, any organisations interested in participating in this work should contact costing@hfma.org.uk. » Download PDF
	Materiality and quality score (MAQS) template - Mental Health (April 2013) The HFMA mental health costing practitioner group has developed a materiality and quality score (MAQS) template and scoring system for the mental health sector. The template looks very similar to the updated acute MAQS template. However, it has been written by mental health costing practitioners and the options included to allocate costs are specific to mental health to reflect differences in costing methodology, data availability, and the more limited implementation of patient level costing (PLICS). Organisations are actively encouraged to complete the MAQS template and to feedback any issues. HFMA plan to actively consult on this template during the financial year 2013/14.  Please send any comments or feedback to costing@hfma.org.uk. » Download XLS