New South Wales families yet to use their Active Kids and Creative Kids vouchers this year have just over two weeks left to take advantage of the schemes, as a question mark hangs over the future of the popular initiatives.
Implemented by the former Coalition government to relieve cost-of-living pressures and see more children engage in sports and extracurricular activities, Active Kids provides families with a $100 voucher for each school-aged child to go towards sport or active recreation.
In a similar vein, Creative Kids is a $100 voucher to be spent on creative or cultural pursuits such as music lessons, art classes, drama or learning a language.
READ MORE: Steep increase in teen smoking in Australia for first time in two decades
Both vouchers are set to expire on June 30.
The Labor government has remained tight-lipped on whether the program, implemented by the Coalition in 2018, will be renewed in 2024 – meaning this may be families' last opportunity to take advantage of discounted sports and extracurricular programs.
So how can families make the most of the vouchers, and what organisations will still take them?
READ MORE: HECS-HELP debt has been reindexed. This is what it means for you
Where to use Active Kids vouchers
All school-enrolled children aged 4.5 to 18 in New South Wales with a current Medicare card are eligible for the $100 vouchers.
This includes those who are home-schooled or enrolled in secondary school education at TAFE NSW.
If you haven't already, you can apply for the voucher here.
While the vouchers expire at the end of this month, the sports or activities don't necessarily have to be undertaken by then – so long as the provider redeems the voucher via the Service NSW portal by June 30.
This leaves families with a range of options to make the most of the vouchers, including paying ahead for your child's next term of swimming or tennis lessons.
READ MORE: How to report scams in Australia and what you can do to stay safe
Many clubs will allow you to do this upfront online by entering your voucher details when you pay the fees. For others, you may need to sign up and complete your registration before contacting the club to get a credit placed on your account.
Alternatively, you could use this as an opportunity to explore something new, such as a school holiday program in the circus arts and flying trapeze, or the less adventurous could sign up for mindfulness and meditation classes.
Or you could sign your child up for Scouts and use the voucher upfront to cover the cost of membership and registration.
It's worth noting that the vouchers can only be used for one transaction, so if your purchase is less than $100, you'll lose the remainder.
READ MORE: Explained: How changes to Netflix password sharing affect you
Where to use Creative Kids vouchers
With the same eligibility criteria as Active Kids, Creative Kids vouchers can be accessed here.
Using these vouchers may seem less straightforward for many parents than Active Kids, but the scope is wide.
Valid creative pursuits include everything from the more obvious art, music and drama classes through to the more obscure – with coding, parkour workshops, architecture and robotics programs all fair game.
Many dance and gymnastics classes are also able to accept both Active and Creative Kids vouchers, meaning you could potentially save up to $200 off the cost of one child's lessons.
Kids can't make it to in-person classes?
Many providers are offering online creative workshops where kids can join others in real-time with tutorials led by an expert, such as tie-dye, clay modelling and painting workshops run by Charlie Boots
There are options for the tech heads too, with coding camps and engineering clubs accepting the vouchers.
Another option is to sign up for an annual family pass to a cultural site, such as the Australian National Maritime Museum in Darling Harbour, which includes access to art workshops and select performances for all your children throughout the year.
You can access a full list of providers for your area on the Service NSW website.
READ MORE: Which states and territories get a long weekend for the King's Birthday?
Sign up here to receive our daily newsletters and breaking news alerts, sent straight to your inbox.