New Enterprise Allowance Phase 2

New Enterprise Allowance (NEA) Phase 2 will build on the success of the current NEA scheme and act on the recommendations of the review undertaken by Michelle Mone. The current NEA scheme is designed to support DWP customers of working age move into self employment. It provides business advice and support, particularly business mentoring, to help out of work participants who want to move into self employment develop their business plan, start trading and offers further support in the first 26 weeks of trading. Extending this support further, NEA Phase 2 will include additional delivery requirements including offering support to already Self Employed people in receipt of Universal Credit (UC) who are already self employed and trading. NEA Phase 2 will be delivered via contracted provision across Great Britain in up to 14 Contract Package Areas from 3rd April 2017, with an initial referral period of 2 years up to 31st March 2019 with these participants being supported on programme until 30th September 2020. DWP reserve the right to extend the contracts for up to a further 2 years subject to funding availability and performance.