APPLICATIONS HAVE OPENED for the 2025 Back to School Clothing and Footwear Allowance. 

The allowance is a one-off payment intended to help eligible families with the cost of school uniforms and footwear ahead of the upcoming school term. 

The rate of payment for 2025 is €160 for children aged 4 – 11, and €285 for children aged 12 years and over in second level education.

More than 114,000 families, in respect of approximately 197,000 children, will automatically receive the allowance in the week beginning on 14 July. 

The majority of payments will be paid automatically with no application required.

Announcing the opening of applications, Minister for Social Protection Dara Calleary said that his department had secured over €54m for the scheme this year. 

The department is currently processing the payments and families will receive confirmation informing them of their automatic entitlement on their MyWelfare account or by post, a statement said. 

Families who do not receive notification of an automated payment should make an application online, even if they received a payment last year.

Calleary said that although more than 75% of payments under the scheme will be paid out automatically, he urged all families to check their eligibility. 

The closing date to apply for the scheme is 30 September 2025. Students aged between 18 and 22 years old must be returning to full-time second-level education run a recognised school or college in the autumn of this year to retain and entitlement to the payment. 

Over 30,450 families in Dublin will automatically receive the payment in July. The next county with the largest number of families receiving the payment is Cork, with 10,733 families. Leitrim has 970 families receiving the payment, the least in the country.