To not understand the threshold for free school meals?

[AllTheBloodyWashing]

I am a lone parent to 11 year old twins who are starting secondary school this week.
I work part time and earn under £16000pa
and get a top-of universal credit, I applied for free school meals for my dc but it has come back and I have been declined.

I’m honestly so upset and really don’t know how I’m going to cope with this extra payment each week for my dc to eat at school, I’m barely scraping by as it is and have just used my last £20 to top-up their dinner cards so they can at least have something for the next two days.

so aibu to not really get the threshold for it, when so many families are really struggling at the moment.

So chuck some cherry Tom's in the pasta and a diced pepper in the quesedillas.

We always have at least 3 veg with evening meal. Lunches are fine.

@YellowPlumbob
Of course packed lunches don't cost more than school dinners. That's just nonsense.

I earn a little more than you but there's no way I will be letting my dd have a school lunch everyday 1) because of cost and 2) looking at the menu I don't want her eating all that processed crap. We have agreed she can have a school meal once a week.

My ds wasn't eligable as i get wtc...so if you work no matter the income no fSM

To the posters saying where's the veg in the £1 per packed lunch post...add a carrot. £1.06. Not rocket science.

i could never justify the cost of hot dinners to myself. We could have afforded it, but I preferred to spend that money on other things that benefitted the kids more. They still ate a balanced, healthy packed lunch.

Its crazy to waste money on that if you can’t afford it, when there are other options.

Flipping hell, the threshold is that low! I am shocked with that. My kids never got FSLs, packed lunch every day was cheaper. In the final year of primary I paid for a school lunch on a Friday but it looks like that isn't an option now. If you buy lots of mini pots you can chop carrot sticks and separate little pots of grapes and cherry tomatoes, make the food last. I'm sure you are all better at that than I would be now though.... still surprised at the threshold. And disappointed if I'm honest. Kids lunches should be a priority and families should not be on the breadline to get some help!

We have a good joint income but can't afford school diners every day!

Mine take sandwiches most of the time and can have 2 hot dinners or hot snacks each week but that's all.

Packed lunches are definitely the way forward. Mine take leftovers, pasta salad etc. I just cook a bit more the night before.

@PicaK no ever six is pupil premium it's not fsm. However fsm onky run out when the UC till out finishes abs the child leaves their current stage of education either primary or secondary.

*and

16 hours on the "national living wage"

This is what I thought, clearly I was very wrong.

I only saw the email from the school this evening and have nothing really suitable in for packed lunch, so I topped it up and thought that would do for now and at least they can have something for a few days until I can top up my shopping and get stuff in for packed lunches.

Well, one of my three DC - so I needed 15 lunches not 10 - is dairy free, so not pesto or cheese (DF anything was £££ even just 2 years ago, not so much any more with supermarkets having their own versions now and I’m yet to find a DF cheese my DC will eat!).

Certain crisps not allowed (basically no fried crisps which rules out most of the cheap ones).
Cereal bars not allowed.
Jam or chocolate spread sandwiches not allowed.
Biscuits not allowed.

Example

Tuna pasta with sweet corn, cucumber and tomatoes OR ham/cheese sandwich with cucumber and tomatoes OR pasta/pesto - quite often I had to make two separate lunches to accommodate DF child so again, extra work.

DF yogurts which were £2.50 for 4, so £5 a week so she could have them over the weekend as a snack. Frubes or similar for the other two.

Two pieces of fruit - one as a snack which I had to provide.

Baked fucking crisps and making sure one lot was DF.

Small side salad each - lettuce, peppers, cucumber, tomato, etc.

Some form of snack/pudding thing, I’ve blocked that from my memory because between having a DF child and bullshit rules it was stressful.

Between waking up at 5:30am to get us out the door at 7:30am, drop them off and myself on the bus at 8am for a 60 min commute, feeling lucky if I had a 30 min gap between lectures and labs once that day, getting home at 6:15pm, then having to cook something fast to feed them as they wouldn’t eat at wrap around as it was all bread based, then reading/homework, bath, bedtime routine - 8:30pm.

By which point my Elvanse has long worn off, I’ve been on the go for 15 hours, I’ve got to clean up from dinner, make their lunches, get myself fed and in the shower (I have Coeliac so again, another dietary ballache), shove a load of laundry in, sort out my notes from that day, check my timetable and bag for the next day, I wasn’t getting to bed till 11:30pm. Paying for school dinners meant I could go to bed at 10:30pm.

No it wouldn’t take an NT person an hour to do lunches but I was fucking fried and the amount of effort it took to think about what to make then make it, after a month I’d had enough. I had exams to revise for, coursework to do - which all has to be done outside the 8-6 Mon-Fri childcare because that’s taken up with travel and lectures/labs.

Stating that packed lunches are cheaper and easier comes from a privileged point of view.

Partners, part time work, time to faff around, no disabilities.

Oh shut up.

Of course it does when you have THREE children and one of them has dietary requirements. It’s not fucking cheap buying dairy free stuff.

Single parent to a disabled child earn less than £1100pm and never been entitled to free school meals.

I was told by my dc school that they stay on the pupil premium list but are not entitled to fsm any longer. Also does this apply if a child moves from primary to secondaey school?

@AllTheBloodyWashing were your children getting free school meals in primary school?
If so then they should still be entitled now due to the protection period which is in place for the rollout of UC, you shouldn't have to apply again it should go with them.
I get working tax credits but still on a low income and have been told that even though I'm not entitled anymore, my children have protected status on fsm until the end of the phase of schooling they're in in March 23.
Can you call the school tomorrow and enquire about it?
If not then definitely look into packed lunches, what bumps the price up I find is cheesestrings, branded yogurts etc. It can definitely be done on a budget.

Sounds like a very large part of your problem was being a student when you had 3 kids and no support and the stress around school dinners was a side effect. I hope things are easier for you now.

No it doesn't

That’s what I thought and my dc did initially get Fsm whilst in reception, then we moved to another Borough that has a policy in place that all primary aged children get Fsm, so was under the impression that I could just reapply and they would get it.

If your time is worth anything then school meals work out cheaper. Especially given the gourmet options favoured by Mumsnetters - all the little pots of hummus and cut up grapes and kiwiberries must be a pain to scrape out.

We're lucky we can afford to pay for our kids to have school lunches. Towards the end of last term the prices of the meals doubled. I refuse to pay stupid amounts for a meal which the kids said wasn't even tasty or warm.

It doesn’t have to at all. DS1 has numerous allergies but packed lunches for him can still be cheaper than school lunches.

The fact you have 3 DC isn’t relevant to whether packed lunches are cheaper than school lunches as you compare the price per child.

I an a TA (so low wage) and have 4 kids at school plus my DH takes a packed lunch. It’s a lot cheaper than school dinners (unless you are buying branded products, cartons of raisins, crisps etc).

I make them all the evening before on a sort of production line!
Supermarket own brands for everything.

Sandwiches with fillings such as cheese, ham, tuna, yeast extract, cucumber, sliced chicken, jam.

Veg sticks - carrots, celery, peppers, cucumber (I make a big batch that lasts 3 days in fridge before they get used up)

Small apple that fits in lunch box or half of a larger one cut up. Occasional alternative to apples - pears, grapes, satsuma.

Sometimes we have dried fruit eg raisins (decanted from a 1kg pack into a little Tupperware pot), apricots or prunes.

I never give crisps or yoghurt in a pack up but often give a biscuit type snack bar from a multi pack.

There are very few families who can afford school dinners after KS1.