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Funding Forms

Funding forms allow you to manage government-funded childcare hours for children at your setting. You can create forms, send them to parents for completion, approve submissions, and manage renewals — all from within Pigeonhole. View our video guide to creating a funding form:

Ways to Complete a Form

The three ways a form can be signed: online by the parent, on paper, or in person on your device.

Creating & Sending

Learn how to create, verify, and send funding forms to parents.

Approving & Managing

Approve, reject, manually update, renew, and copy funding forms.

Renewal Settings

Choose when your setting renews funding forms and which terms parents can select.

Live Register Check

Compare your council’s live register export against Pigeonhole to spot funding mismatches.

Funding Rates

Set the hourly council funding rates used across forms and finance projections.

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Frequently asked questions

We recommend you do as it synchronises the funding and invoice systems to reduce the workload, but you can just use the funding form functionality and manually input any charges or funded hours. Setting up sessions and charges provides:
  • Automatic calculation of chargeable hours on funding forms
  • Synchronization between funding and invoicing
  • Better oversight of funded vs. charged hours
  • Reduced manual data entry
However, if you only want to use funding forms without the full invoicing system, you can absolutely do that and manually enter the required information on each form.
When a form is awaiting approval, it means the parent has completed and submitted their portion of the form. To maintain data integrity and provide a clear approval workflow, the form is locked during this stage. If changes are needed, you can reject the form with comments, and the parent can make corrections and resubmit.
While you can edit approved forms, any changes will not appear in the original PDF that was signed by the parents. The signed PDF always shows the data as it was when the parent completed the form. This ensures the integrity of the signed document while allowing you to update your records if needed.
No, approved forms cannot be deleted as they represent completed agreements with parents. You can only delete forms that are in draft, sent, or rejected states. This protection ensures you maintain records of all completed funding agreements.
Online forms are completed by the parent in their own portal, through a link emailed to them — this needs the parent to have been invited and logged in. Manual forms are for parents who can’t do that, and they can be finished in two ways: downloaded as a PDF for the parent to sign on paper and upload back, or signed by the parent directly on your device. A manual form accepts either, so you can start one way and finish the other. You can convert a form between online and manual at any point before it’s approved. See Ways to Complete a Form.
Chargeable hours and costs are automatically pulled from the child’s current schedule and extra charges. If these appear incorrect, it usually means the child’s schedule or extra charges were updated after the form was created, or the changes haven’t been properly set up in the system. Check the child’s schedule and extra charges to ensure they’re current.
No, you only need to input the DOB type and number if you’ve already seen the physical document. The system remembers this information for future form renewals. Only upload the document if you need to keep a digital copy on file.
There are two options, and neither needs the parent to have a Pigeonhole account. You can create a manual form which generates a pre-filled PDF to be completed on paper and uploaded back. Or, if the parent is with you at drop-off or pick-up, they can sign on your screen — nothing to print or upload. See Ways to Complete a Form and the step-by-step guide to signing in person.
Use the ‘Expires’ filter on the funding forms list to see forms nearing expiration. For approved forms, you can use the ‘Renew Funding Form’ action which creates a new form pre-filled with all the previous data, saving time on data entry.
Every parent who has been marked as ‘Has Parental Responsibility’ is required to sign the form (although both parents can sign at the same time under one logged in parent). If parents are incorrect check which parents are selected as ‘Has Parental Responsibility’ against the child.
Simple click ‘Convert to manual’ in the funding list view actions. You can then edit the form and upload your own PDF version of the form.