The balance of payments, worth over €550m to 120,000 farmers, will start issuing from Monday 1 December. Minister for Agriculture Simon Coveney confirmed that the money will be landing in bank accounts early next week.

However, due to the volume, it could be Friday before the last farmers will get the money. With the majority of farmers paid, the Department will focus resources on the remaining farmers to be paid.

The minister urged farmers to respond to outstanding queries as soon as possible and said that regular payment runs will continue to be made on both schemes on a twice-weekly basis.

“The balance of payments next week will bring the total value of payments made to date under the 2014 SFP to over €1.1bn, while payments under the Disadvantaged Areas Scheme have exceeded €185m,” he said.

Farmers can also expect to see payments under AOES and REPS, as well as the Grassland Sheep Scheme start to flow the following week, all providing a welcome boost to cashflow.

Another bit of good news this week is that Irish farmers will get €27.2m back from the EU. In total, €868m is to be reimbursed to EU farmers, with the French the biggest winners, getting €194m back.

This money was originally deducted from farmers whose direct payments were over €2,000 in 2013.

The 2.45% cut included 1% for the crisis reserve, which was not used in 2014, as well as to ensure budget ceilings were met.

The news came too late for the Department to include the payment in the balance of payment, but farmers should get the money in early 2015.

Farmers with SFPs over €2,000 will see a cut of around 1.3% taken from the balance of payments. This is to establish the crisis reserve for 2015.

The support measures taken from August in the wake of the Russian embargo will only come through in the 2015 budget, but unused funds will be used before the crisis reserve again in 2015.

It means there might be some left to give back to farmers in December 2015.

The other cut to come out of the balance of payments next week is the claw-back for land eligibility review. The Department is writing to over 10,000 farmers this week. It outlines that the cuts for the majority of farmers is less than €300 and gives them an option to appeal if they have not done so already.

The latest figures show that, of the 10,700 farmers who appealed, 8,448 have been processed, but 2,261 are still to be fully processed.

The cuts will be taken from these farmers in the balance of payments this week, but will be reimbursed if their appeal is successful. The Department expects the vast majority of current appeals will be concluded by the end of January 2015.