Dear Service Provider,
As it is coming up to the Christmas holidays and the end of 2024, it may be necessary to make important changes for the National Childcare Scheme (NCS) on your Early Years Hive.
As such, the following points are covered in this announcement:
NCS Service Calendars (adding closures)
NCS weekly returns
NCS Bridging payments
We advise making any necessary changes as soon as possible to ensure payments under NCS are not affected.
NCS Service Calendar (adding closures)
If your service is closed over the Christmas and New Year’s period, you must mark the closures on your NCS service calendar on the Early Years Hive accordingly – this must be done in advance of the closure period, NCS calendars cannot be adjusted retrospectively. You must also note whether it is a subsidised (paid) closure or not. Services are entitled to up to 10 subsidised closures per programme year.
For guidance on adding closures to your NCS service calendar, please see the ‘How to add a Closure’ heading of the NCS Service Calendar Guide.
NCS Weekly Returns
As per the NCS funding agreement, NCS returns must be submitted on the Early Years Hive each week. Returns become available from the last day (Sunday) of the reporting week and must be submitted by Tuesday of the following week to ensure that payments will be issued that week. This rule is the same throughout the Christmas and New Year’s period. A bridging payment is available to service providers during periods of subsidised closure. If you are unable to submit returns during a closure period, please see the below section on bridging payments.
If a return is not submitted within the required timeframe, all subsidy payments will be suspended until it is submitted. All service providers should ensure any outstanding returns are submitted before the end of the year. For guidance on returns, please see the NCS Attendance Returns Guide.
If you miss the option to avail of a bridging payment but feel you will be unable to submit an NCS return due to closure, you may still avail of a grace period payment. Please see here for more information on grace period payments. Please note however that you can only make two grace period requests within the contracting period, and you may not make a request twice in a row.
To request a grace period, contact the Early Years Provider Centre by raising a Request using the following categories:
Programme: NCS
Programme type: Returns
Programme type detail: Other
NCS bridging payments
A ‘bridging payment’ is available to service providers during periods of subsidised closure, if they are unavailable to submit their weekly NCS return i.e., Christmas holidays, mid-term breaks, etc.
When submitting the NCS return that is two weeks before the subsidised closure period, the Early Years Hive recognises the closure coming up and asks the following: “You have an upcoming closure, do you want to request a Bridging Payment for the dates from “X” to “Z”? (Yes/No)”
If yes is selected, the payment is made during the week the service is closed i.e. when they are unable to submit their returns. You must then submit ‘Fast returns’ for this period when you return after the closure. Example: If a bridging payment is requested for Christmas week, 23-29 December, returns will not be able to be submitted until 30 December.
For guidance on returns, please see the NCS Attendance Returns Guide.
