Claiming additional funding for meals uptake above 90 per cent

The Mayor of London is providing £135m emergency funding to help families across London with the spiralling cost-of-living crisis, by ensuring all primary-school children in state-funded schools have access to a free school meal during term time for the 2023-24 academic year. This funding will help up to 287,000 primary-school children in the capital receive free school meals (FSM), and could save families around £440 across the year.

This page gives an overview of the process for schools to provide evidence to claim additional funding. This process will be in place for the academic year 2023-24. 

Schools have been allocated funding for pupils who are not receiving government funding for FSM. This calculation was based on the number of non-government-funded pupils at KS2 on census day in January 2022, at a rate of £2.65 per meal, and assuming up to 90 per cent of pupils take the Mayor’s FSM. Note that 2022 census data was used as a more generous funding offer for boroughs and schools, compared to the 2023 census.

Funding is issued to local authorities, and they administer the funding to their state funded schools.

Where a school has over 90 per cent pupil uptake, they can claim for the additional funding if they can provide the evidence listed below. 

Please note, the following process is optional. Only schools where their pupil meal uptake rate is over 90 per cent, and they want to claim additional funding, are required to follow this process. 

Schools that wish to claim for over 90 per cent uptake are asked to provide snapshot data on school meal uptake at two points in 2024. Both data submissions must show uptake rates are above 90 per cent.

Schools should note that the additional funding they claim will directly reflect the percentage uptake above 90 per cent. For example, for a claim showing 96 per cent meal uptake, the school would receive 6 per cent more funding than their original allocation. This top-up funding first goes to the borough, who should then issue the difference to the school before July.

The data must show the take-up rate as it occurred on the following two dates:

• 18 January 2024
• 13 March 2024

If either of these dates are not suitable, schools will need to choose another date from that week (15-19 January and 11-19 March). Schools with a high proportion of children practising Ramadan may wish to choose the week before to collect data for the second data collection date – 6 March. Schools should make a note of this on the form and notify their local authority when they submit the information.

Schools will need to complete a form (outlined in the form template linked in section 4) on these two dates, and share with their borough officer before 28 March. 

Schools may be required to provide additional information (such as school dinner records) if requested by the GLA.

Schools should ensure the data form is checked and signed by the head teacher before submitting to the borough officer. The GLA will request further evidence if forms do not provide sufficient detail. 

If schools have experienced an increase in pupil intake during this academic year, which impacts the number of pupils on roll, and thus meal uptake, they should contact their borough to notify the GLA via a separate process. 

Your named borough officers will have been in contact with your school identifying themselves; providing their contact details; and giving further details on the wider monitoring and evaluation process.

If you are unsure who your borough contact is, please email the GLA at [email protected]. 

This process requires schools to enter data on meal uptake for two key dates, i.e. 18 January 2024 and 13 March 2024.

Schools must download a Summary Form excel template to enter data manually.

Follow this process:

• Download the Summary Form for monitoring school meal uptake (in link above). 
• Manually enter the data for school meal uptake. This must be done for both dates in January and March, before sending to boroughs. 
• Check the data is accurate and that priority information is showing.
• Ensure head teacher checks data, and signs form before submitting. 
• Email borough lead with the Summary Form with both dates as evidence before 28 March. 
• Boroughs may have their own process for collecting forms. 

Once schools have checked the Summary Form, they should email this to the borough officer with any supplementary notes. 

Schools should send both collection dates in one form at the same time. 

The GLA asks borough officers to check the form received from schools. The GLA will only consider forms that include the correct information. The GLA may request further information or evidence as outlined below. 

The GLA will review meal uptake figures and the number of pupils on roll in January 2024. These figures will be compared with the original funding allocated and with the number of pupils on roll in January 2023. As allocations were based on January 2022 census figures, this will be taken into consideration when top-up figures are calculated.  

If schools have experienced an increase in pupil intake in this academic year, which impacts the number of pupils on roll, and thus meal uptake, they should contact their borough to notify the GLA via a separate process. 

The act of submitting the data to the GLA through the local authority automatically confirms the return as authorised by the head teacher. This disclosure indicates schools have entered accurate data that has been validated by the head teacher. 

As part of the GLA’s checking procedure, schools may be asked to provide further information before any funding is issued, particularly if data is missing or incomplete in forms. 

Information may include:

• official uptake data downloads from management information system (MIS) provider platforms
• uptake data from catering providers
• school meal registration forms. 

• 18 January – data collection 1
• 13 March – data collection 2
• 28 March – last date to submit form to boroughs
• 30 April – last date for boroughs to submit claims to GLA
• May – the GLA issues funding to boroughs
• July – boroughs issue funding to schools

If either of these data collection dates are not suitable, schools will need to choose another date from that week (15-19 January and 11-19 March).

Schools with a high proportion of children practising Ramadan may wish to choose the week before to collect data for the second data collection date – 6 March.

Schools should make a note of this on the form and notify their local authority when they submit the information.

This section outlines the process for boroughs, specifically with links to a template form to be uploaded to the GLA OPS platform.

Schools have been allocated funding for pupils who are not receiving government funding for FSM. This calculation was based on the number of non-government funded pupils at KS2 on census day in January 2022, at a rate of £2.65 per meal, and assuming up to 90 per cent pupils taking the Mayor’s FSM. Note that 2022 census data was used as a more generous funding offer compared to the 2023 census, allowing additional flexibility for boroughs and schools.

Funding is issued to local authorities, and they administer the funding to their state-funded schools.

Where a school has over 90 per cent of pupils taking up the offer, they can claim for the additional funding if they can provide the evidence as listed below. 

The GLA asks local authorities to play a role in processing the claims on behalf of their schools. The process for this is outlined below: 

• Boroughs will be sent full details on the process in December
• Boroughs will need to inform schools about the main borough contact relating to this process
• Schools should collect their data in January and March. They should only email boroughs with supporting evidence for both dates 
• Between 15 March and 28 March schools will email boroughs with their forms as evidence 
• Boroughs are asked to check forms are complete
• Boroughs are asked to check head teachers have approved forms with their signature 
• Download the borough form to complete information about all schools. Log onto OPS to upload the borough forms and the school forms. Officers have until 30 April to submit evidence on OPS 

You must download the borough form to summarise schools data. Boroughs should download this first, enter the data on their schools, then upload to OPS.

The GLA will review all claims submitted via OPS after the deadline on 30 April. Once a claim is approved, payment takes about four working days. The GLA will write to boroughs with their allocations, and issue funding to boroughs, before the end of May. 

Boroughs are asked to administer the funding to schools before the academic year ends in July 2024. 

The GLA asks schools to submit claims by manually entering data into a template form on two dates in 2024. 

Details of the process can be found in earlier sections of this guidance, directed at schools. 

The GLA may ask for further information from schools if their form submission is missing data. This could include downloads of school meal uptake data from their MIS providers or catering providers. 

Schools will need to access information according to the following: 

• total number of pupils on roll in Years 3 to 6, for January and March 2024
• total meals taken by government-funded FSM-eligible pupils in Years 3,4,5 and 6
• total meals taken by pupils eligible for non-government-funded FSM (Mayor-funded meals)
• percentage uptake by pupils eligible for non-government-funded FSM eligible (Mayor-funded meals).  

As part of this process, MIS providers do not necessarily have to make changes to their platforms due to schools adhering to a manual process. However, they should be aware of the information required should schools contact them about obtaining this information.