Pharmacies can now register to provide the new children’s flu vaccination service for those aged two to three years old.

Registration for the new Advanced service – announced as a one-season trial last month – is now open on the NHS Business Services Authority’s Manage Your Service (MYS) portal.

Pharmacy owners that choose to provide the service will be able to commence vaccinating eligible children from 1 October 2025.

Those opting to participate will receive £9.58 per vaccination administered – funded from NHS vaccination budgets, rather than the Community Pharmacy Contractual Framework (CPCF) global sum.

Under the new service, the majority of eligible children will be vaccinated with the Live attenuated influenza vaccine nasal spray suspension (LAIV), supplied to pharmacies from centrally procured stock.

To receive vaccines before the start of the service in October, Community Pharmacy England (CPE) said pharmacy owners will need to register on the MYS portal by 11.59pm on 31 August 2025.

‘Later registration will be possible, but the provision of the centrally procured vaccine will be received after the starting date for the service,’ it said in a statement on its website.

The service specification has been published by NHS England (NHSE) and the Patient Group Direction (PGD) should be published by the UK Health Security Agency during the next few weeks, CPE noted.

News of the trial service follows negotiations between CPE and NHSE.

According to Alastair Buxton, director of NHS Services at CPE, the new service was ‘fully aligned’ with NHS England’s vaccination strategy, the government’s recently published 10-year plan for health, and a ‘strong desire’ within the community pharmacy sector to provide more NHS vaccination programmes.

The Company Chemists' Association (CCA) previously welcomed the commissioning of the new service, with chief executive Malcolm Harrison describing it as ‘a vote of confidence’ for community pharmacy.