Early Years Providers 2, 3 and 4 year old Early Education funding

Working parents who are eligible for Tax-Free Childcare can set up an online Tax-Free Childcare account to pay for childcare.

For every £8 a parent pays into their Childcare Account, the government adds an extra £2. Parents could get up to £2,000 per child per year towards their childcare costs, or up to £4,000 for a child with a disability.

Parents will only be able to make payment to a Childcare Provider if that Provider is signed up to Tax-Free Childcare.

While parents can't make payments using both Tax-Free Childcare and (Employer) Childcare Vouchers, Providers who are signed up to Tax-Free Childcare can receive payments from both schemes.

Signing up for Tax-Free Childcare

Childcare Providers will need to sign up to receive payments from parents. You must be a regulated or approved childcare provider to receive Tax-Free Childcare

If you are not already registered with a regulator or approved childcare provider e.g. Ofsted or a Childminder Agency, we recommend you do this now, so that your customers can pay you using Tax-Free Childcare.

To sign up you should be the main contact for your business. You’ll be able to set up a ‘delegate’ to manage your account for you during the process.

You’ll need your:

• 11-digit user ID from your invitation letter - if you did not get one or have lost it, contact the helpline on 0300 123 4097
• bank account details
• your business postcode (the one registered with your regulator, for example Ofsted)
• National Insurance number, if you are a Nanny

You can sign up online it usually takes around 10 minutes.

Managing your account

Using your account is quick and easy. You can use it to:

• change your delegate information.
• update your bank account details.

If you don't want to run your own account, you can give access to someone else (your delegate), who'll be able to manage your account on your behalf, including updating your details in that account.

How parents can find you

Once you've signed up to Tax-Free Childcare, parents can use the Childcare Provider Checker to search for you, using your:

• name (the name you registered with your regulatory authority);
• address or postcode;
• regulator reference. For example, if you are registered with OFSTED this will be your Unique Reference Number (URN)

How parents make payments to you

Parents can use their Tax-Free Childcare account to make regular or one-off payments direct to your bank account. The payment should only take 2 to 3 working days to arrive in your bank account. When you receive a payment from a parent, this will include both their payment and the government contribution.

Tax-free Childcare payments have a reference number of 4 letters and 5 numbers, followed by 'TFC'. The letters are made up of the first initial and the first 3 letters of the surname of the parent making the payment. For example, AJON12345TFC. This will help you link the payment to a specific child.