Qualifications and Credit Framework

The Qualifications and Credit Framework (QCF) was the national credit transfer system for education qualification in England, Northern Ireland and Wales between September 2011 and October 2015.

The QCF replaced the National Qualifications Framework (NQF), which closed for accreditations at the end of 2010.

The EQF is a meta-framework intended as a reference so that qualifications in nation frameworks such as the QCF are understood across member states.

The QCF does not include previous qualifications that are now defunct, such as the O Level which was replaced by GCSEs in 1988.

Officially, defunct qualifications are not part of the QCF and therefore have no level, but are still as valued as their replacement equivalent.