Funding information for parents.
At St Michaels Preschool 15 hours term time funding is universally available to all 3 and 4 year olds in the term following their third birthday until they go to school. Parents do not need to do anything to claim this universal funding except complete a funding form from the preschool and provide proof of ID.
30 hours extended (15 hours universal + 15 hours extended) funding is available to families who meet the claim criteria. You can check your eligibility and begin to make a claim by visiting www.peterborough.gov.uk/30hoursfree.
Both funding options can be used at one or more settings, term time only (or stretched all year round for settings that are open where 15/30 hours become 11 and 22 hours)
Parents must check their eligibility, apply for their unique 30 hour code and give it to preschool in good time. If parents are successful, they will be issued with their code, and notified by email or via their online childcare portal. The code must be given to the preschool as soon as the parents receive it. Along with the code, we also require a screen shot or printed confirmation which clears shows the date that the code was applied for. This code remains the same through out the funding claim however it MUST be renewed every 3 months by the parents. HMRC should send email reminders to the account holder and its important to act on the reminders swiftly to avoid missing the cut off dates.
Our setting then has to input your 30 hour code to the Local authority portal to verify its eligibility, we will then receive one of two responses from the Local Authority
True – means the code is valid and can be used to claim your child’s funding payment
False – this means the data entered on the checker doesn’t match the governments checking system: this could be a data/admin error on our part and this will be checked in the first instance and re submitted. If the code still comes back as invalid then we must look at the code claim date, end date etc.
This must all be done PRIOR to the term in which your child will claim their funding so that any issues can be cleared up before the claim period. Please see below for claim dates.
IMPORTANT CLAIM PERIODS
Please note that parents must have applied for and received a start date for the code BEFORE the start of the funding period.
The funding periods are:
1st January to 31st March to claim, the code must have a start date before 31st December
1st April to 31st August to claim, the code must have a start date before 31st March
1st September – 31st December to claim, the code must have a start date before 31st August.
For more help and advice please speak to a member of the pre school or visit: