Short-Term Enterprise Allowance: keep your Jobseeker's Benefit while you start a business

What it pays

The allowance replaces your jobseeker's payment and is paid at the same rate, including any increase for an adult or child dependant. It goes into your bank account every week.

It runs for the rest of your Jobseeker's Benefit entitlement. That is 9 months at most, or 6 months if that is all you were entitled to. Every week you wait before applying is a week less on the allowance.

If you are on Jobseeker's Pay-Related Benefit, the rate still steps down as it normally would. The Department's own example: someone on the top rate of €450 a week who moves to the allowance after 13 weeks drops to €375 at week 14 and €300 at week 27.

You keep any extra benefits you already had, such as a medical card, as long as you still meet their conditions.

You can see what you would be paid over the months you have left.

Who qualifies

• You are getting, or are entitled to, Jobseeker's Benefit, Jobseeker's Pay-Related Benefit or Jobseeker's Benefit (Self-Employed).
• You are setting up a new business that is not trading yet.
• The business will trade all year round, in the State.
• You have a written recommendation from your Employment Personal Adviser before you start self-employment.

You can set up as a sole trader, a partnership or a limited company.

If you have been on a means-tested jobseeker's payment for nine months or more, look at the two-year allowance for people who have been out of work longer instead.

Who is refused

• A business that was already trading before you applied.
• A franchise, or selling under a brand that is already established.
• Seasonal, temporary or part-time self-employment.
• A business likely to take trade unfairly from local competitors because of the State support. The Department calls this displacement.
• A business in a local market that is already crowded. The Department's guidelines give taxis as an example of a sector it does not support.
• A second claim for a different business within five years of the first.

You cannot take a job as an employee, full-time or part-time, while you are on the allowance.

What you have to write

There are two parts. Form STEA1 is 8 pages of personal details: your PPS number, your family, and where the payment should go. The business plan is where the real work is.

The Department's guidelines say the plan must have, as a minimum:

• a full description of the business idea, including how and where you will trade
• how you will comply with the legal requirements for that kind of business
• a business cashflow, showing incomings and outgoings such as public liability insurance, rent, rates, stock and equipment
• an answer to any concern about displacement or a crowded local market

The plan has to show the business is viable and can last. Do not count the allowance itself as business income in the cashflow.

How to apply, step by step

1. Tell your Employment Personal Adviser at your Intreo Centre that you want to start a business. Do this before you trade.
2. The adviser does a short first assessment. They will tell you about your Local Development Company, which can help with the plan. For this allowance that help is optional, and the adviser can skip it if it would cause a delay.
3. Fill in form STEA1 and write the business plan.
4. The adviser makes a signed recommendation and sends it to a Deciding Officer, who makes the final decision.
5. If you are approved, register as self-employed with Revenue.

The start-up grant that goes with it

Once you are approved, you can also apply for money towards equipment, insurance and other start-up costs. On this allowance the most you can get is €1,000 if your claim runs 9 months, or €625 if it runs 6.

You have to pay at least 20% of each cost yourself and show quotes from two suppliers. The costs must already be in your business plan, so think about them before you write it.

It does not cover rent, vehicles, stock or travel.

If you are refused, and when it ends

In 2025 the Department registered 780 claims for this allowance and awarded 404.

If your adviser does not recommend you, you can ask in writing for a review within 21 days. A different adviser or an area manager looks at it. You can also ask for a Deciding Officer's refusal to be reviewed by another Deciding Officer. Because the scheme is not set in law, you cannot appeal to the Social Welfare Appeals Office.

When the allowance ends, you do not go straight back onto Jobseeker's Benefit if the business has not worked out. You can apply for Jobseeker's Allowance, which is means-tested.

If you need money to get started, the State-backed lender for very small businesses lends to start-ups.

Common questions

Keep reading

• how to answer the displacement question in your plan
• the smaller grant limits on a 6 or 9 month claim