Free school meals

[meandmypickle]

If you are eligible to claim to free school meals, do you get a cash amount which you can either spend on school meals or put towards packed lunches? Or is there no actual monetary payment and you just get the school meals free?
Also does anyone know the criteria for receiveing this benefit and are maintenance payments taken into account?
TIA

We got them when dh was a student - criteria was income under £16k per year, and in receipt of CTC only (not WTC). And they are exactly as they say - free school meals.

Free school lunches

Parents do not have to pay for school lunches if they receive any of the following:

Income Support
income-based Jobseeker's Allowance
income-related Employment and Support Allowance
support under Part VI of the Immigration and Asylum Act 1999
the Guarantee element of State Pension Credit
Child Tax Credit, provided they are not entitled to Working Tax Credit and have an annual income (as assessed by HM Revenue & Customs) that does not exceed £16,190
Working Tax Credit 'run-on' - the payment someone may receive for a further four weeks after they stop qualifying for Working Tax Credit

From direct.gov.uk

Yes you do . It's £2.20 here for canteen.... Anything over has to be paid on top. Is that what you mean?

They don't 'give' you cash..... A packed lunch from home has to be funded by you

our school used to give the free school meal children a little ticket that they would hand to the dinner lady when getting their meal. Now the children all have card that need money loaded on to them to get their lunch. The children getting free meals get £1.70 loaded on to the card each day and then get their meal in the same way as everyone else. Supposed to stop discrimination and everyone is treated equally.

It seems wrong that even though the criteria is 16k or less you aren't entitled if you get WTC even if your income is below 16k, can't see how they justify this myself.