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By Rachel Lawler

 

HMRC has apologised for the associated with the Childcare Service website since its launch earlier this year.

 

John Thompson, chief executive at HMRC, said he was 鈥渧ery sorry鈥� that parents were experiencing problems with the service. He said that 244,000 parents have applied for tax-free childcare and/or 30-hours free childcare using the website so far.

 

From these initial applications, 208,000 parents have both with their codes and accounts set up. However, 2,600 parents are still waiting for a technical issue to be resolved.

 

HMRC has issued 1,138 30-hours eligibility codes manually and a total of 拢45,687 has been paid to parents as compensation in lieu of top-up payments they were unable to receive. HMRC has also made 373 payments directly to providers after parents were unable to access their accounts.

 

Thompson also said that the service was currently 鈥榦n track鈥� to meet the Department for Education鈥檚 target of having 200,000 successful applications for the 30-hours by 31 August.

 

Thompson was writing in response to a , chair of the Treasury Select Committee, who had queried the performance of the Childcare Service site. Morgan welcomed HMRC鈥檚 response, but said that 鈥渃learly, further improvements are still required鈥� as many parents have still been unable to access the service.

 

Morgan said of HMRC鈥檚 response: 鈥淲hilst it is welcome that HMRC has made 鈥榮ignificant improvements鈥� to the website since it was launched in April, thousands of parents are still unable to apply for the childcare to which they are entitled in the way that the government has envisaged.鈥�

 

Neil Leitch, chief executive at the Alliance, commented: 鈥淲e recognise that HMRC are working hard to rectify the problems with the website, but the fact remains that thousands of parents and childcare providers have been adversely affected by these glitches.鈥�

 

Neil added: 鈥淲hile we welcome Nicky Morgan鈥檚 intervention on this matter, it really is a case of too-little-too-late. Both 30 hours 鈥榝ree childcare鈥� and tax-free childcare were key conservative manifesto promises, which the government seem wholly unprepared to deliver. The very least we expected was investment in an IT system that parents are able to use, and through which providers are able to receive the payments that their businesses rely on.鈥�