Early Years and Childcare Special Newsletter
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Monday 30 June 2025
As we prepare for the final stage of the Early Years Funded Entitlement (EYFE) expansion, we wanted to take this opportunity to recap the changes that will be coming into effect from September 2025, and provide you with updated documents to support you to claim funding correctly.
EYFE schemes from September
The main changes are:
- the Working Families entitlement for the '9 month plus' and '2 year old' age ranges increases to up to 30 hours a week
- some children will be eligible for both 'Local Authority (LA) issued 2 year old EYFE' and '2 year old EYFE for Working Families' at the same time - this is for a maximum of 30 hours a week
- please note, not all 2 year olds are eligible for either scheme and there is no universal entitlement. It is important to make sure that you are checking eligibility before providing a funded place.
The table below sets out the types of funding and the maximum number of hours that can be accessed in a week:
|
EYFE Scheme
|
Maximum hours per week (over 38 weeks)
|
Maximum hours per year
|
|
9 month plus EYFE for Working Families
|
30
|
1140
|
|
2 year old EYFE for Working Families
|
30
|
1140
|
|
LA issued 2 year old EYFE
|
15
|
570
|
|
2 year old EYFE for Working Families and LA issued 2 year old EYFE
|
30 (15 of each)
|
1140 (570 of each)
|
|
Universal EYFE for 3 and 4 year olds
|
15
|
570
|
|
Universal and Extended EYFE for 3 and 4 year olds
|
30 (15 of each)
|
1140 (570 of each)
|
Updated Parent Declaration and Provider Declaration
To reflect the funding changes for September, we have updated the Parent Declaration, Notes on completing the Parent Declaration document and the Provider Declaration. All of these documents can be found on our webpage.
The new version of the Parent Declaration should be used in the following scenarios:
- when a child starts accessing funded hours for the first time (all new starters for autumn term 2025 onwards should use the form that has the last updated date as ‘from September 2025’)
- when there is a change to any of the details on the form, including changes to sessions attended or number of hours claimed
- when submitting a claim for Disability Access Fund
- when submitting a new claim for Early Years Pupil Premium.
The Parent Declaration should be signed by both provider and parent before headcount day to be able to claim at headcount as noted in point 4.22 of the Provider Declaration Form.
Changes to the Online Provider Portal - save the dates
The autumn term headcount submission will introduce a new ability for providers to check if children on the working 2 year old claim are also eligible for LA issued 2 year old EYFE under the economic criteria.
We will update the guidance in due course and will run training sessions via Microsoft Teams. These sessions will cover both these new changes and a general recap on how to submit your headcount claims via the portal. Please save the training dates listed below. More information on how to book these sessions will be provided in an upcoming newsletter.
- Tuesday 9 September - 10.00am to 11.30am
- Wednesday 10 September - 1.00pm to 2.30pm
- Thursday 11 September - 6.30pm to 8.00pm
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