The operational guidance includes statutory guidelines, information on how to help parents access and pay for the support, and case studies of how free entitlements have been delivered in some of the 12 pilot sites across England.
It suggests that local authorities encourage providers to deliver flexible packages of hours within certain parameters, which include that no session be longer than 10 hours, that there is no minimum session length, that a session does not start before 6am or end after 8am, and that a parent can only access the hours from a maximum of two childcare sites in a day.
It also confirms that government funding is not intended to cover the cost of "meals, other consumables, additional hours or optional activities". Childcare providers have previously raised concerns that the £4.30 hourly funding rate the government will provide from September to cover the cost of delivering the care is too low.
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