Finding a new job and sorting childcare at same time???? help

[jonnytekno]

Our son is 9 months old and we are struggling with how to sort out my wife returning to work, so was looking for any advice

She is on [statuatory] maternity leave from a job which she does not want to return to, and which would be impractical anyway. She therefore needs to find part tim work locally, but actually going about this seems very complicated.

We have a place at a local nursery provisionally booked for September, but they keep pressing us for days of the week, which of course we don't know yet. I guess we just have to pick days and a start date and then she has to try and get a part time job for those days starting on that date. She hasn't really looked for work yet but this feels like it is going to be very challenging. The nursery are pretty unhelpful - we have asked for advice on how best to manage it, but they pretty much ignore us.

We don't despreately need her to go back to work on a specific date, its just that the nursery wanted to be specific hence the Septmber date. In an ideal world, she would spend some time looking for the right thing and then sieze the opportunity when it arose, but then how do we manage childcare and/or a nursery place in this scenario? Do we try and get a private nanny until a place comes up in the nursery? This sounds expensive? Our families do not live close so them helping out is not an option.

We are literlly at a loss as to how to go about this, any advice from people who have been through it would be much appreciated.

[jimijack]

Firstly if your wife does not return to her job, will she have to pay back maternity pay? Many employers insist on a period of return or pay back any monies paid out during mat leave.

Secondly can you afford to put baby in nursery if your wife is not working?
If you can then there may be the option of keeping the place, choosing the days and applying for jobs. When a job is found, you may be able to swap day's around a bit to suit the new job.

As many nurseries have waiting lists for children, you may be at risk of losing the place if you don't let them know as there may be 5 other children/babies waiting to take that place.

It doesn't need to be complicated and really its nothing to do with the nursery how you organise yourselves so it's unsurprising that they are not willing to advise or guide you with this.

I'm sure that there will be someone along with more wisdom than me.

[insancerre]

I run a nursery and am looking at project ted numbers for sept at the.moment
I need to know the numbers as I need to know I have enough staff to maintain the legal ratios
if you don't know what days your wife will be working then one way would be yp book a fulltime place for September then when you do know for sure what days you will need you could drop days assuming the nursery needs one months notice
it will be expensive at first but it is the only way to guarantee that you will get the days you need I don't get why you expect the nursery to be giving you advice really
they are a business providing a service not an advice service