Nursery Funding

The government, both previous and current, have always been very naughty about how they advertise this offer.

The autumn funding period runs from 1st September to 31st December, 17 1/2 weeks.

However for a child needing the full 30 hours a week the government only fund for 14 weeks between those dates.
If a child has a "stretched" offer the government funding is paid over 16 weeks, but pro-rata and not for 30 hours a week.

It sounds like this is what your daughter has been misled/ confused by, hence the bill for the extra hours required ☹️

The nursery is at fault for not making sure she understood exactly what she'd be funded for and what she'd need to pay herself.
She needs to read her contract carefully.

If it's any consolation she can pay the amount due using a Tax Free Childcare account, via Government Gateway.
That will give her a contribution towards her bill.

Surely paying for 7.65 hrs at nursery isn't going to force her to give up her job? Working three full days a week has to bring in more than the nursery fees.

V3ra is correct about the tax free childcare payments which makes it all the more likely that this would mean her giving up work.

Unlikely not likely.

I can only think how the families who have paid 10’s of thousands over the years for childcare think .
However that is a separate issue.
The government will not be paying anything like the rate parents paid per hour previously so the Nurseries will be raising the fees on the hours they can charge for, to be able to carry on.
Expect to see some closures in the future.

Two of my kids in one camp two in the other. To be honest I haven't heard the two older ones comment on it so I don't know what they think although as their children are older, university costs now, it was probably cheaper then than it is now.

Basically only term time support. I know some Nurseries might tweak the hours for you, spread them over the week. However, it's a business and they have to cover any cost beyond the Government funding.
My DS and DIL who are not local to us were paying about £1200 a month until recently for childcare and after school clubs for my 2 GD's. Youngest GD has just started school so they will save a considerable amount.

Yes, this is correct - term time only.
My youngest DD is very grateful for this, as it covers a significant percentage of the nursery costs, meaning that her salary adds to the family finances, rather than going almost entirely on childcare.

Plus £17 per day for food and drinks!
Didn’t make a lot of difference for my DDs, but they just had to accept it for the short term.
As you say, you could help fund it?

I am puzzled as to why the nursery let the amount owed build up so much? Surely it would make sense to issue invoices on a monthly/4 weekly basis?

Additional cost for a month is over£400!

My youngest DD is in the same situation, receiving the 30 hours a week free childcare. I agree that the application system is a nightmare and she had a lot of difficulties getting the code to input, but as to the how much is covered financially, the advice on the Government website states quite clearly that:

"What you'll get
If your child is aged 9 months to 4 years old
You can get 30 hours of free childcare per week for 38 weeks of the year." The website also mentions the extra payments to be made by parents for food, nappies etc.

So 14 weeks need to be funded by the parents.

I too am surprised that the nursery has let it get to the stage of a big bill all at once. My daughter's nursery told her exactly what she would be paying per month after the 30 free hours had been applied to her costs. They also charge per four weeks, so there wasn't a big surprise bill after a full term.

My son earns well over the threshold to be eligible. His wife chooses to work 18 hours a week. They pay for the little one to go to nursery one day a week.

My younger child is now in his late 20s, so it must be 23 years since I used childcare for nursery. I can't remember the details, but some help for childcare was just being introduced and I received something for him in the last year or so.

The system was much as it is now. It only covered 30 hours a week for 38 weeks a year. The nursery my son went to only accepted 51 weeks a year placements. A full week was deemed to be 50 hours.

51 x 50 = 2550
38 x 30 = 1140

Therefore, my son received funding for less than half of the time he was registered and I had to pay the excess myself. I didn't qualify for any support. I was a single parent and my son's father managed t squirm out of paying me any maintenance.

I'm not "pityfishing" - just pointing out that it has ever been thus.

helensf

Additional cost for a month is over£400!

She must be earning more than that so it doesn't make sense for her to give up work.

Georgesgran

Plus £17 per day for food and drinks!
Didn’t make a lot of difference for my DDs, but they just had to accept it for the short term.
As you say, you could help fund it?

My son recently had a bill from pre-school where it seemed that he was paying for the food but not for the childcare.

His daughter eats next to nothing!

No one pays £17 a day for a child's meal-it's bonkers.

We paid the bill because it was GD's last term but I couldn't make head nor tail of what we were actually paying for...

...the application system is a nightmare and she had a lot of difficulties getting the code to input...

The other thing that catches people out is that the funding is for three periods of time a year, more or less in line with the school calendar.

However the eligibility code parents receive must be renewed four times a year, and if that isn't done in time they don't get the funding for the following period.

Then there are the age categories, the latest headlines being that babies can have funding when they're nine months old.
In reality, they can have funding from the start of the next funding period after they reach that age.
So a baby who turns 9 months old on the 2nd September won't qualify for any funding until the 1st of January, four months later.

Trying to explain all the complexities of the system to parents who have believed the headlines is not easy.
Applying for the funding on their behalf is far from straightforward sometimes.

helensf, I think that is at the cheaper end of the scale to the costs that lots of parents have to pay over and above the 30 free hours. Surely she earns more than £400 per month for three days a week?

My daughter took the view that even if a large part of her salary was paying towards childcare in the early years, it was worth it to keep her place in the workforce and progress upwards once their circumstances changed in the years to come.

I know not all couples have the same jobs/opportunities/choices of course.

helensf

Additional cost for a month is over£400!

If she sets up a Tax Free Childcare account through Government Gateway she will get 20% of that paid for her if she's a standard rate tax payer.

The way it works is that for a bill of £400, she pays £320 into her TFC account and the government automatically adds £80.
Then she finds the nursery on the system and transfers the £400 to them.

(The nursery needs to be registered with the system but I would expect they will be).

V3ra totally agree - yet another example of a system where it seems to have been made deliberately difficult to Joe Public to apply in order to put people off from accessing what they are able to claim.

I think back to when my kids were small and we got no help whatsoever with childcare.

I would find this confusing.

It seems wrong that the “free” hours are only for term time when most parents (unless they are teachers) work for 52 weeks less whatever holiday they get.
.

Primrose53, we too had no help and nurseries were almost unheard of in our area. In my group of friends, the only one that had help to go back to her profession used a childminder as that was just about the only choice available and she was lucky that her childminder was a trusted family friend - no OFSTED or vetting in those days!

I would hope that things have progressed since then. The world has changed and I am so grateful that I had the choice to have the first 3 years with my children at home although it was tough financially (I went back to part-time work when the younger one was a year old by working two evenings and Saturdays in a supermarket when my DH was at home to look after the children.) Many parents don't have that option now as it takes two decent salaries to have a basic standard of living.

I too would find it confusing, and it makes me very cross that the system seems to be making it deliberately so.

Two of my kids use the system and the tax free account. I guess I raised very clever kids as they read the rules, applied and we're very grateful for the financial help.