What is this site?

The LGfL Free School Meal (FSM) Checker is a free online service that allows parents to quickly check whether their children are eligible for free school meals. It also helps schools and local authorities manage these applications. This website only offers FSM checks and is a replacement for the legacy LGfL FSM Checker, introducing new features and improved usability.

How does it work?

Parents enter a few basic details online and the system securely checks them via the Department for Education, which in turn accesses government records including the Department for Work and Pensions, the Home Office and HMRC, to provide an instant yes or no answer. This removes the need for paper applications and speeds up the process for schools. Parents only need to apply once, and schools can recheck their eligibility at any time.

Schools also have access to their own portal, where they can view and manage the FSM applications for their school.

Who are LGfL?

LGfL (London Grid for Learning) is a charitable trust whose mission is the advancement of education. As a not-for-profit organisation, we reinvest everything back into supporting schools rather than making a profit. Since 2014, LGfL has identified over £239 million in potential funding for free school meals!

Our passions include saving schools money, keeping children safe, protecting and securing schools, tackling inequality, energising teaching and learning, and promoting wellbeing.

From the start of the 2026-27 academic year, FSM eligibility is expanding. There will now be two categories of benefits-based FSM:

• Targeted FSM - for households receiving Universal Credit with annual earnings of £7,400 or less. This is unchanged from the existing threshold and continues to attract pupil premium and other disadvantage funding.
• Expanded FSM - a new category for households receiving Universal Credit with earnings above £7,400. These pupils receive free meals but do not attract pupil premium or other disadvantage funding.

The LGfL FSM Checker will incorporate these changes and return the relevant tier (targeted or expanded) for each application. This is expected to be available from June 2026, once the DfE has made the necessary changes on their end.

Transitional protections are also ending. Since 2018, pupils who became eligible for FSM have kept that entitlement even if their household circumstances changed. These protections end at the close of the 2025-26 academic year. From September 2026, all households must actively meet the eligibility criteria to receive free meals.

For full details, please refer to the Free school meals: guidance for schools and local authorities.

Checking and recording Free School Meal (FSM) eligibility is vital for both families and schools.

For pupils and families: FSM entitlement ensures children receive a free, nutritious meal at school each day, which supports wellbeing, concentration, and attainment.

For schools: Confirmed FSM eligibility unlocks additional funding through the Pupil Premium Grant. This provides schools with thousands of pounds in extra funding to support teaching, interventions, and wider provision for disadvantaged pupils.

By using the LGfL FSM Checker, schools can make sure no eligible child misses out on this support and that schools access the maximum funding available to them.

If your school or local authority would like to register for this service, our team is here to help. We’ll guide you through the registration process and answer any questions you may have.

Sign up here

If you are a school or local authority administrator with access to the system, a dedicated user guide is available. You can find it here:

• Administrator FAQs and Guidance

If you need any further help, please don’t hesitate to get in touch.

Over the next few months, we will be replacing the legacy LGfL FSM Checker with this new version. The updated checker introduces a range of new features, including bulk uploads, and simplifies the process for parents (for example, no longer requiring USO accounts).

• Instructions for migrating data from the legacy LGfL FSM system

Yes, this website is fully GDPR compliant. Protecting pupil, parent, and school data is of the highest importance to us, and we follow strict security and compliance standards to ensure that all information is handled safely and responsibly. Schools can be confident that any data submitted through this service is processed securely and only used for its intended purpose.

For more details, please see our Privacy Policy, which explains how data is collected, used, and stored. Further information about our wider data protection commitments can also be found at lgfl.net/policies.

If you need to speak to the Department for Education about a specific FSM eligibility result or have questions about FSM policy, schools can submit their query via this online form or call the DfE helpline on 0370 000 2288 (Monday to Friday, 9am to 5pm).