We are giving early childhood education and care providers more time to apply for the worker retention payment and receive backdated payments.
We will now backdate payments for providers who:
- submit an application by 30 September 2025
- meet the eligibility criteria from 2 December 2024.
We will backdate payments to:
- 2 December 2024, for workplace instruments that cover the full grant period even if adopted later
- the date the workplace instrument starts, if this is after 2 December 2024.
The deadline for requesting a funding review with backdated funding has also been extended to 31 October 2025.
Learn more about the worker retention payment.