PeopleCert pursues former City & Guilds chiefs for £3m ‘unauthorised’ bonuses

PeopleCert is seeking to recover almost £3 million in bonuses paid to former City & Guilds chief executive Kirstie Donnelly and finance chief Abid Ismail after an internal investigation concluded the payments were “unauthorised”.

The Greek-owned awarding organisation announced today that it will pursue the pair over a total of £2.9 million in bonus payments allegedly approved without the knowledge or authorisation of PeopleCert, the City & Guilds board or the charity that previously owned the business.

The move follows the dismissal of Donnelly and Ismail without financial settlement in April for alleged gross misconduct, after they received bonuses of £1.7 million and £1.2 million respectively shortly after PeopleCert’s acquisition of City & Guilds Limited (CGL) in October last year.

According to PeopleCert, Donnelly and Ismail “directly authorised and paid bonuses” to themselves and other CGL staff, worth £5 million in total, “without authorisation” from the CGL board, PeopleCert or City & Guilds London Institute.

Pay rises were also allegedly made without formal authorisation.

A PeopleCert spokesperson said: “These payments were not brought to the attention of PeopleCert until December 2025, a month after they had been paid, and there was no provision, board resolution, or other binding instrument that authorised these payments.

“It also found that salary increases for the [executive leadership team] and other colleagues were also made without formal authorisation from the CGL board or PeopleCert.

“These actions were in direct breach of their duties and responsibilities as office holders and caused significant harm to the organisation’s reputation.

“In the case of Kirstie Donnelly and Abid Ismail, we intend to take all action available to ensure the recovery of these amounts (£1.7 million and £1.2 million respectively) and will make appropriate referrals to the relevant authorities.”

PeopleCert said other executives who received bonuses will also be asked to repay them in full. However, payments made to around 60 other staff members will be “ratified” by PeopleCert and “no attempt will be made recover the amounts, given the investigation’s conclusion that recipients were neither fully aware nor instrumental in the scheme”.

The findings came from an investigation carried out by a committee of non-executive directors, led by Michael Milanovic, chair of PeopleCert subsidiary LanguageCert, with support from legal advisers Balfour+Manson.

PeopleCert said a subsequent appeal process, led by CGL non-executive director Richard McCarthy CBE, did not uphold appeals against the dismissal decisions.

The findings have been shared with the Charity Commission, which launched a statutory inquiry into City & Guilds in January following the sale of the historic charity’s commercial business.

PeopleCert’s own investigation has expanded to look at “allegations of manipulation of information” about the level of investment required to upgrade City & Guilds’ IT systems provided to bidders during the sale process.

Donnelly and Ismail are understood to be preparing their own legal action against CGL following their dismissal. They have been approached for comment.

In an internal email this morning, seen by FE Week, Nicolaides told City & Guilds staff the bonus issue has created “a challenging environment” for the business that he was now pleased to “draw a line under”.

He said: “Whilst some will continue to voice their opposition to the private ownership of City & Guilds, we must remember some important context.

“Our acquisition followed a fully intermediated, competitive process involving multiple international bidders, with PeopleCert selected as the preferred party as we offered the highest price and had significant experience of operating regulated products and services.

“We also had the global scale, expertise, technology capability and investment commitment needed to develop the organisation for the long term.”

He claimed that under its charity owner, City & Guilds had been loss-making for the previous eight years, was losing market share, had been issued regulatory fines for “failings of governance and technology control”, and did not have the ability to fund the “scale of transformation required”.