Training Foundation Trainees Across Multiple Sites: A Group Employer's Checklist

Training foundation trainee pharmacists across several branches? A checklist for group employers covering NHS England deadlines, DS registration, DPP access, rotations and progress reviews.

By Umar Majid · 9 Nov 2026

If you train foundation trainee pharmacists across several branches, every trainee needs a lead designated supervisor (DS) based at their primary site and registered with NHS England by the deadline. They also need confirmed access to a designated prescribing practitioner (DPP) and their own training plan. Miss the DS deadline and the trainee's start moves to the next window. For the summer 2026 intake, that deadline was midday on Monday 15 June 2026.

The checklist below follows a group employer through the year, from Oriel registration to final sign-off.

Dates for your group calendar

What	Date
Oriel employer registration for 2027/28	Closed midday, 3 March 2026
Oriel employer registration for 2028/29	Not yet confirmed. Expect early 2027
DS registration, summer 2026 intake	Midday, Monday 15 June 2026
Summer 2026 start window	13 July to 3 August 2026
Training plan submitted	July, as the trainee starts
Autumn 2026 start window	19 October to 9 November 2026
Final sign-off can begin	From week 49
Next GPhC exam	Tuesday 15 June 2027

Deadlines change every year. Check your NHS England regional newsletter and set reminders for each site lead.

1. Before you register places on Oriel

Oriel deadlines fall more than a year before the trainee starts, so you have to make decisions for each site early.

Count DS capacity per site. A DS can now supervise more than one trainee, which helps groups. But job planning must give them enough time for each trainee, and the training plan has to describe it.
Confirm DPP access per site. As of February 2026, more than 400 trainees who needed a DPP in 2025/26 didn't have one assigned. Don't enter a place without a realistic DPP plan.
Check each site meets the basics: at least 26 weeks in a patient-facing setting, and access to a dispensary supervised by a GPhC registrant.
Plan rotations for 2027/28, when full implementation of multi-sector rotations is expected.

2. Before each trainee starts

Register every DS with NHS England by the deadline. You'll need the trainee's Oriel PIN to complete the form. If a supervisor isn't registered in time, the trainee is deferred to the autumn window.
Notify NHS England of the DPP and prescribing setting details before the trainee starts.
Complete pre-employment checks and contracts in line with Oriel requirements.
Write one training plan per trainee. NHS England asks for a plan that describes that trainee's actual programme, uploaded by the lead DS through the e-portfolio. Our guide to writing a foundation training plan goes through it.
Name a group lead: one person who tracks deadlines, supervisor registration and progress across all your sites.

3. Induction: group-wide and site-level

It helps to split induction into two layers. The group-wide layer covers company policies, the e-portfolio, the assessment strategy, expectations for the year, exam planning and wellbeing support. The site-level layer covers SOPs, the PMR and digital systems, local services, the team and the trainee's rota.

Trainees must complete mandatory training such as first aid, safeguarding, health and safety and your digital systems within the first 13 weeks. NHS England's core training offer also includes an induction to the programme, so release your trainees to attend it.

A shared group induction day helps trainees build a peer network across branches. It also means every trainee hears the same message.

4. How do you keep standards the same across sites?

Groups often find quality varies by branch, usually because of one DS's time or experience. You can reduce that with:

a standard training plan template, adapted for each trainee and site
the same protected learning time at every branch, written into the rotas
a DS network that meets every few months to share practice and calibrate sign-off
one exam preparation approach across the group, so no trainee is left to work it out alone

5. DPP access across a group

These are the options groups tend to use:

central prescribers who act as DPP for trainees at several branches
rotations into general practice or hospital where a DPP is available
reciprocal arrangements with another employer
external DPP programmes, some run by local community pharmacy committees

The DPP must have oversight of the 90 hours of prescribing-related learning, but doesn't have to supervise all of it directly. Our guide to independent prescribing in the foundation year has more on this.

6. Rotations

A rotation of 13 weeks or more at another site needs a named DS or DPP there, responsible for supervision during that time. The employing organisation submits the training plan, including the rotation, and the host site helps write its section. NHS England offers optional template rotation agreements.

On the money side, NHS England has suggested £1,000 to £1,500 of the training funding can be used as a placement fee for a rotation into another site. You keep paying the trainee's salary during the rotation.

7. Tracking progress reviews

Progress reviews fall at weeks 13, 26, 39 and 52. With several trainees on different start dates, a simple tracker saves you a lot of trouble.

Track for each trainee	Target or check
Observed clinical activities by week 13	At least 3 (interim) or 5 (full learning outcomes)
Observed clinical activities by week 26	At least 6 (interim) or 10 (full)
Learning needs analysis	Repeated before week 26
Prescribing hours log	Updated at every review
Progress review forms	Every section completed in the e-portfolio
Concerns	Recorded with an action plan, escalated early

NHS England's trainee support guide classifies concerns into three levels, with Level 3 reported to NHS England. Agree in advance who in the group handles escalation. There's more detail in our 26-week review guide.

Wales and Scotland

This checklist is for England. In Scotland, modular programmes across several sites need a lead training provider reported to NES, and every site must be within reasonable distance of the base site. In Wales, HEIW's multi-sector foundation year uses NHS Wales Shared Services Partnership as a single lead employer. Check with your statutory education body.

Common questions

Does each site need its own designated supervisor? Each trainee needs a lead DS based at their primary training site. A rotation of 13 weeks or more also needs a named DS or DPP at the host site.

Can one DS supervise more than one trainee? Yes, that's now allowed, as long as job planning gives them enough time.

What happens if we miss the DS registration deadline? The trainee's start is deferred to the autumn window.

When do we register places for 2028/29? It hasn't been confirmed. The 2027/28 window closed on 3 March 2026, so expect early 2027.

Are multi-sector rotations mandatory yet? Not for 2026/27. Full implementation is expected for the 2027/28 cohort.

Bring every site up to the same standard

At Pre-Reg Shortcuts we support group employers and designated supervisors through the whole year. Every trainee gets the same structured GPhC revision, e-portfolio support and a 1:1 planning session around their rota. If you're enrolling more than 10 trainees, we run an in-person induction.