Free School Meals

What is automatic enrolment for Free School Meals?

The Benefits Service administers awards of Free School Meals where customers have applied for one alongside their Housing Benefit and/or Council Tax Support. However our data shows that over the years not all parents or carers with children entitled to a free school meal have applied for one, which means children are missing out.

If eligible children are automatically signed up for free school meals, no one will miss out. We are running a project to see how well this works. 

We are data matching information we already hold about families who get Housing Benefit and/or Council Tax Support and determining whether there are children in the household who could be eligible for a free school meal but are not receiving one.

If we think your child may be eligible for free school meals and not getting them, we will write to you. 

I'm happy for my child to be automatically enrolled

The letter will explain that if your child is eligible we will automatically enrol (sign up) them up for free school meals. You do not need to do anything. We will process the application, notify the school, and send you a letter when it is done. 

I do not want my child to be automatically enrolled

Your letter will explain that you can opt out of the free school meal auto-enrolment process, and gives details of how you do this. You only need to contact us if you have received a letter from us. 

Frequently asked questions

• My child already gets free school meals. Why have I been sent a letter?

Children in Key Stage 1 (nursery to Year 2) automatically get free school meals. These are called 'universal infant free school meals'. All children get them, no matter which benefits their family gets. However, we would still like to sign up key stage 1 children so the school receives the correct funding.

For children in Key Stage 2 onwards (Year 3 and above) entitlement to free school meals is related to your income. Children can only get them if their family is getting certain benefits. When a child is getting income-related free school meals, their school can get extra money to help support that child. We'd like to sign your child up for income-related free school meals.

• How does this help my child?

Your child can get a healthy, hot meal at school every day if you wish. It can also save you over £400 per year per child on the cost of lunches.

Schools get extra money from the government for every child entitled to free school meals. This money can help support your child's education.

• What if I'd rather give my child a packed lunch?

Your child does not have to have a school meal if you do not want them to. But we would ask that your child is signed up for free school meals anyway, so their school gets extra money from the government to support them.

• What will you do with my data?

We use personal data to check and decide on applications for Free School Meals. We also use data we already have in relation to Housing Benefit and/or Council Tax Support to check if families of pupils, who have not already applied, could be missing out on Free School Meals. If parents or carers do not object to the automatic enrolment of the pupil, we will do this for them. 

We will use your surname, National Insurance number and your date of birth so that we can check if you qualify for free school meals. When we use your information, the government’s electronic free school meals checking service gives us a simple reply – YES or NO. This is how we check to see if you qualify for free school meals 

We use this data to help us deliver our ‘public tasks’. The laws that allow us to handle these applications and to enrol pupils in Free School Meals include the Education Act 1996 and Localism Act 2011.

Your data is kept securely and we have to follow very strict procedures about how we look after your personal information under UK data protection law.