Free school meals - vouchers for supermarket - any news?

[magicmallow]

My son is eligible for free school meals due to his dad being on ESA.

I read that you can receive a £20 weekly voucher for this.

To date our school offered a collectable packed lunch daily, which we are unable to collect.

They have not offered an alternative, but I see the govt has mentioned this should be offered.

Does anyone have news on this? Is it only certain localities that offer the vouchers?

They would be a huge help at the moment, I'm not sure why it's taking its time in terms of info. They just said there would be a council meeting (a few days ago) with news to follow but no news since.

We got a £15 Asda voucher per child first thing on Monday morning.

My dc are in a secondary academy in Nottinghamshire. A set meal at their school is £2:30 and usually this £2:30 is put onto the children's parent pay account automatically every day. So they can't spend it on a massive pizza on day one.

I agree Georgie. I can't understand how people can complain about this. £11.20 is a perfectly reasonable amount fit five lunches. And complaining that they will have to have the same every day! 🙄

Why is it possible to go to the supermarket and collect food but not your DC's school?

Err because the school want you to collect it daily mon-fri where as you only need to go to the supermarket once a week. Thought that was quite obvious, we are suppose to be minimising the times we go out and not everyone lives opposite the school, my children’s one takes a bus to get there. Which I would rather not get on at the moment, whereas I have a supermarket a 5 minute walk from my house. As you can see the majority on this thread get vouchers and all other threads I’ve seen so packed
Lunches that need to be collected daily seems odd considering the circumstances.

Well just got an email from my children’s school to say they will be giving vouchers so looks like even the school have worked out why it’s not practical aswell.

I’m getting £11.50 per week in supermarket vouchers. I got to choose which supermarket I wanted xx

I got to chooae between three supermarkets and its 16.45 per child per week where i live. Voucher sent by email.

There's another thread on this, but I'll add my experience here too.
My younger DC are secondary school age, and while at school they get £2.20 per day credited to their dinner account.
They were sent home on Friday with a letter to take to our local children's centre, where we were given a £10 Asda voucher each - so actually less than they get while at school. Only £1 less each but still less. I can't understand why there is such a discrepancy between areas - some families are getting £20/£15/£11/£10 vouchers, others are having to go out (against government advice?) to collect packed lunches. FWIW I think that everyone should get a voucher emailed to them for a standard amount.