The Education Bureau today announced measures to tighten the vetting and monitoring of kindergarten application fees. The measures are in response to the recommendations made in the Ombudsman's investigation report on the issue. The bureau will require kindergartens to formulate a clear mechanism and increase transparency on the collection of application fees, explaining to parents the purpose of and rationale for the fees. It will ask approved kindergartens to collect application fees exceeding the ceiling to provide past records of income and expenditure for assessing the feasibility of reducing the approved amount. It will explore the feasibility of approving the collection of application fees with a specified validity period instead of granting one-off approval.