With the summer school holidays comes the HMRC reminder to working parents with childcare costs that they can use Tax-Free Childcare (TFC) to pay for regulated holiday clubs during the school holidays.
In April 2017 HMRC started rolling out tax-free childcare, a scheme designed to help working parents with the cost of childcare, with up to £2,000 of support per child per year, or £4,000 for disabled children. Since February 2018 the scheme has been open to parents whose youngest child is under 12, (or under 17 if disabled). It is intended that this will replace the employer support childcare voucher arrangement which is due to end in October 2018.
Parents, including the self-employed, can check they meet the criteria and apply online for tax-free childcare by visiting the Childcare Choices website. Parents can also access the government’s childcare calculator through the website, which is designed to help them choose which government childcare support is best for them.
Parents are advised that it is possible to pay into their account regularly and ‘save up’ their TFC allowance and use it for childcare during school holidays.