School Trips, Voluntary Contributions and What Schools Can Actually Charge For

A school cannot charge you for the education on a trip, only for board and lodging on a residential, and from this September every Universal Credit family is exempt from that too.

The question parents ask is usually the blunt one: can schools charge for trips, and can they insist? The law is clearer than the letters home suggest. Charging in English state schools is governed by sections 449 to 462 of the Education Act 1996, and academies are bound by the same rules through their funding agreements. The short version is that education in school hours is free, a narrow list of extras can be charged for at cost, and anything described as a voluntary contribution has to behave like one.

What a school cannot charge for

The Department for Education's departmental advice on charging for school activities sets the list out plainly. A governing body or local authority cannot charge for:

• education provided during school hours, including the supply of any materials, books, instruments or other equipment;
• education provided outside school hours where it is part of the national curriculum, part of a syllabus for a prescribed public examination the pupil is being prepared for at the school, or part of religious education;
• entry for a prescribed public examination, if the pupil was prepared for it at the school, or a resit they are being prepared for;
• instrumental or vocal tuition, unless the parent asked for it;
• transport to or from school where the local authority has a statutory duty to provide it, transport to other premises where the pupil is being educated, and transport provided in connection with an educational visit;
• supply teachers covering for staff who are away accompanying a residential visit;
• an admission application. The School Admissions Code rules out requests for money as any part of the admissions process.

That last one on transport is the item most often missed. Coach hire for a curriculum day trip is not chargeable. It is part of the free education.

What a school can charge for

The permitted list is short, and everything on it is capped at cost:

• Optional extras. Education outside school time that is not national curriculum, not exam syllabus and not religious education; exam entry where the pupil was not prepared at the school; transport other than the journeys above; board and lodging on a residential visit; and extended day services such as breakfast club, after-school club and supervised homework.
• Materials the child will own. If you want your child to keep the finished textiles project or the ingredients they cooked with, the school may charge for them.
• Music tuition at your request. Under the Charges for Music Tuition (England) Regulations 2007 this can be individual or in a group of any size, provided the parent asked for it. No charge is allowed where it is an essential part of the national curriculum, where it is delivered under the first access programme at key stage 2, or for a child looked after by a local authority.

Two limits apply to every charge. It cannot exceed the actual cost of the activity divided equally among the pupils taking part, so it cannot include a subsidy for families who are not paying. And a school cannot make a profit from an optional extra. Participation is by parental choice, which means your agreement is a prerequisite before a charge can be made at all.

The 50 per cent rule for day trips

Whether an activity counts as being in or out of school hours is a calculation, not an opinion. If 50 per cent or more of the time spent on the activity falls during school hours, it is deemed to take place during school hours and must be free. Time spent travelling counts where the travel itself happens during school hours, and the midday break does not count as school hours.

So an excursion that leaves an hour before the bell and runs until late in the evening is mostly outside school hours, and can be an optional extra. A trip that leaves after registration and is back by three cannot be charged for.

The rule for residentials, with the DfE's own examples

Residential visits are counted differently, in half days. A half day is any period of twelve hours ending at noon or midnight, and the school day is divided into two sessions. If the number of school sessions used by the visit is equal to or greater than half the number of half days, the visit is deemed to have happened during school hours. The DfE gives two worked examples:

• Away from noon on Wednesday to 9pm on Sunday: 9 half days including 5 school sessions, so the visit counts as during school hours.
• Away from noon on Thursday to 9pm on Sunday: 7 half days including 3 school sessions, so the visit counts as outside school hours.

Either way, board and lodging can be charged at no more than actual cost. What cannot be charged for, on a visit deemed to be in school hours, is the education or the travel.

Who gets it free, and what changed this term

Parents receiving certain benefits are exempt from board and lodging charges on residential visits, and the head teacher has a duty to tell all parents about that right when a trip is announced. Since April 2003 the eligibility test has been aligned with free school meals.

That matters more this year than usual, because the free school meals test has just widened. From the start of the 2026 to 2027 academic year the household income limit of £7,400 has been removed, and a child qualifies for free school meals if the family receives Universal Credit regardless of income. The remission on residential trips follows that eligibility, so a group of families who paid for the Year 6 residential last year do not have to this year.

One practical point worth knowing: the DfE is clear that the cost of remission falls on the school, from its own contingency funds, with no return to complete and nothing to claim back. That is why some schools are slow to advertise the exemption, and why it is worth asking rather than waiting.

Our guides to free school meals and Universal Credit and the real cost of schooling in the UK cover the wider picture.

Voluntary contributions: what the letter has to say

Nothing stops a school asking for voluntary contributions. What the law and the guidance control is how it asks. When a school writes to you about a trip it is required to make clear that:

• the contribution is voluntary and there is no obligation to make it;
• children whose parents do not contribute will not be treated any differently;
• if the activity cannot be funded without contributions, that is said at the outset;
• if not enough is raised, and the school cannot fund it another way, the trip will be cancelled.

The guidance goes further on tone. Parents must not be made to feel pressurised. Schools should avoid colour-coded reminder letters, and should not send direct debit or standing order mandates when requesting contributions. If insufficient contributions come in, the school cannot run the trip only for the children who paid. A parent who will not or cannot pay must still see their child given an equal chance to go, and the school should set out at the start how it will allocate places if it has to.

The policy you are entitled to see

No charge can be made at all unless the governing body or local authority has first drawn up two documents: a charging policy, setting out the optional extras and board and lodging it intends to charge for, and a remissions policy, setting out when charges will be reduced or waived. These must be made available to parents on request.

If a charge does not appear in the charging policy, it should not be on the letter. That is the first thing to check.

What to do if you think a charge is wrong

1. Ask the school office for the charging and remissions policy, and read what it says the charge covers.
2. Work out whether the activity falls inside school hours under the 50 per cent test, or, for a residential, the half days test.
3. Put the question in writing to the school, naming the part of the policy or the legislation you think applies.
4. If that does not resolve it, escalate to the governing body or the academy trust, and after that follow the school's published complaints procedure.

Related reading: our guides to school uniform rules and costs and attendance fines in England cover the other two charges that reach most families. Start at the Schools Insight home page for the admissions and appeals guides.

Sources

• Department for Education: charging for school activities, departmental advice, for the permitted charges, the voluntary contributions rules and the worked half days examples
• Education Act 1996, Part VI Chapter III, for sections 449 to 462, the charging and remissions provisions
• GOV.UK: apply for free school meals, for the removal of the income limit from the 2026 to 2027 academic year