Before setting up automatic Tax-free childcare payments, you'll want to make sure you've given Famly permission to connect with your Tax-free childcare account and linked your child in your Balance tab. Once you've set everything up, setting up automatic Tax-free childcare payments works in exactly the same way as setting up Direct Debit payments or automatic card payments.
To learn more about setting up TFC payments for your account, check out this article:
This article will run you through how to set up automatic Tax-free childcare payments from start to finish - including how to connect Famly with HMRC, linking children, and enabling automatic payments for TFC.
How to Connect your Tax-free Childcare Account with Famly
If you have not yet set up Tax-free childcare:
Head to your Balance tab by clicking on the Home icon in your sidebar
Next, click on Pay and choose Set up Tax-free childcare from the list
On gov.uk, follow the steps to allow Famly to connect with HMRC and click on Give permission to confirm
💡 On occasion, you'll need to give permission to allow Famly to connect with HMRC again. If you see Permission needed in your automatic payment setup, you'll want to follow the same steps as outlined above to give your account a refresh
Now you're ready to link your child and set up automatic Tax-free childcare payments.
How to Link your Child to your Tax-free Childcare Account in your Balance Tab
If you have connected Famly to your Tax-free childcare account, but still need to link your child:
Head back to your Balance tab by going to the Home icon in your sidebar
Click on Set up automatic payments
In the Finish setting up Tax-free childcare section, click on Link children
Once you've selected your child, add their Reference ID
Click on Link child to confirm
From here, you can click on Pay balance to pay with Tax-free childcare, or you can click on Set up automatic payments so you don't need to pay manually going forward.
How to Set Up Automatic Tax-free Childcare Payments
If you have set up Tax-free childcare payments and linked your child, you can set up automatic Tax-free childcare payments. To do so:
Once again, head back to your Balance tab by clicking on the Home icon in your sidebar
From here, click on Set up automatic payments
Next, click on Automate next to Tax-free childcare from the Available payment methods list to automate this payment method.
And that's it! You're ready to pay with automatic Tax-free childcare.
Can Multiple Children be Linked to Automatic Tax-free Childcare Payments?
The short answer is: Yes!
If you're a bill payer for multiple children, you may find that automated TFC payments aren’t possible when more than one child’s Tax-Free Childcare account is linked to your bill payer account. Although multiple children's TFC accounts can be linked to a single bill payer, automation isn’t possible because we can’t guarantee the correct amounts are charged to each child’s account when there's only one invoice.
You can still make manual TFC payments by selecting the amount for each child individually. However, if you’d like to automate payments for all children, each child must be linked to a separate bill payer account.
To do this, ask your nursery to set up additional bill payer accounts—one per child. For example, if two siblings share the same bill payer (perhaps their mum), only one child can be linked to her account to automate TFC payments. To connect your other child, your nursery can create another bill payer account. This could be a duplicate of your bill payer account, using the same details, or an entirely new bill payer account for another contact, perhaps.
💡 Keep in mind, splitting up siblings' bill payers will result in two separate invoices - so they will no longer show on one invoice. It's a good idea to be listed as an Invoice recipient on both accounts, so you're able to see each child's Balance tab