Free School Meals Eligibility changes from Sept 26
Any parent who is in receipt of universal credit will now qualify for FSM with effect from September 26.
For those schools who buy in to the eligibility checking service through GCC there will be two new codes on your list of eligible children.
· Targeted FSM – these are children who will attract pupil premium (as before) as they have a household income of less than £7400
· Expanded FSM – these are the children whose families are on universal credit – these do not attract pupil premium
The FSM team will check all existing children who are eligible for FSM over the summer to update their status on your live link through edu-net.
The team will also continue with the auto-enrolment process.
Universal FSM remains the same.
The advice for schools is to ask parents to apply for FSM in the normal way through the Gloucestershire County Council website.
Apply for free school meals | Gloucestershire County Council
For those schools that do not subscribe to the Council’s eligibility checking service you will need to recheck all your existing FSM children before 1st October 2026. If you wish to subscribe to the service please contact FSM team.