Do you pay your nursery's essentials and extras fee?

You realise nurseries have just put the prices up to compensate for the "free" hours? Parents today aren't hugely better off. Fees have gone up more than £30 a day in the last 2 years.

As someone who just missed out on the new childcare hours and at the time thought, well annoying for me but really pleased for future parents, you are being extremely unreasonable! This money has to come from somewhere! Stay at home parents for example don’t get their children’s lunch paid and only have (usually) one salary to cover it.

Our nursery breaks down the extra charges into nappies, lunch, snacks, sun cream etc. I've always been happy to pay if I know what it's going towards. The care element is funded but the consumables are not, which feels logical. Nursery is expensive sadly, but you would be unreasonable not to pay.

But it’s a private nursery that you are choosing to use?

I don't know the ins and outs of the nursery's finances. We're already paying over £100 a day for non funded hours, so I resent paying a top up fee too when the government says this clearly isn't allowed.

I don't want to cause any trouble though... no idea what other parents are going to do.

How do primary schools manage allergies? My son took a packed lunch for years as he had a problem with eating the school lunches (many other children did too). The named lunch bag had an ice pack, lunch, snacks and a drink. It was hung on his peg each morning with his coat. Parents knew not to add things like nuts.
I think nurseries are using this as an excuse to charge unnecessary fees in some cases and may be detrimental to anyone claiming funded hours who can’t afford a £5 lunch for their child.

How do primary schools manage allergies? My son took a packed lunch for years as he had a problem with eating the school lunches (many other children did too). The named lunch bag had an ice pack, lunch, snacks and a drink. It was hung on his peg each morning with his coat. Parents knew not to add things like nuts.
I think nurseries are using this as an excuse to charge unnecessary fees in some cases and may be detrimental to anyone claiming funded hours who can’t afford a £5 lunch for their child.

they are lying and breaking the terms of the funding agreement.
They have to give you the option of providing your own food

I’m not saying private nurseries can’t exist - they just won’t be eligible to give funded hours which are lot are doing anyway.

Clearly this would be a huge programme but one we need to sort as things are not sustainable as they are.
We should have invested into this while interest rates were at historic lows.

What's your plan while the nurseries are closed and the government realise they need to set something up, then actually do it? Cos if my nursery closes, by the time they sort out the alternative, my daughter will be at school and I'll have had to give up work to look after her til then and we'll be in the crap because we need my wage.

I also have no issues with paying for things my child eats or uses. Why would I have an issue with paying for my child?

What's your plan while the nurseries are closed and the government realise they need to set something up, then actually do it? Cos if my nursery closes, by the time they sort out the alternative, my daughter will be at school and I'll have had to give up work to look after her til then and we'll be in the crap because we need my wage.

I also have no issues with paying for things my child eats or uses. Why would I have an issue with paying for my child?

Really surprised at the number of people saying just pay! Don’t just pay. You don’t have to and there’s legal precedent not to! There needs to be a collective revolt, no one pays and the government is forced
to pay more. Take a look at Companies House and see just how wealthy the owners of the top nursery chains are. It’s no coincidence that they’ve all put up fees as the funding has come in in general, before we look at the top ups. It’s the responsibility of the childcare sufficiency team/officer at your LEA to ensure that there is adequate early years provision. Lobby them for more if the service isn’t adequate. Don’t give extra money you don’t have to to some of the wealthiest people in the land. You don’t find a poor nursery chain or old people’s home owner.

If nurseries close it would force the government’s hands into opening affordable provision. We can’t go on paying this much - we are one of the most expensive countries in the world for childcare and if other countries manage it, then so can we. Having mainly private nurseries is not a model we should have and the government needs to borrow to invest in state sustainable nursery school infrastructure and could be ran with any profits crucially put back into education - perhaps free for core hours but then charge reasonable fees for extra.
The government have already created a degree for the early years leaders so this fits in well.

Nowadays due to the cost of living, both parents are forced to work and for many there is no choice.

We shouldn’t be paying up and shutting up.

This is what I don't understand. Apparently we can't provide food due to allergies. But they still aren't legally allowed to charge for lunch without giving you the option to not pay it.

We need them, yes, but we don't have them.

It might be the case that more women are impacted by this cost, but the alternative is that they decide not to pay, everyone's costs go up, nurseries either close or don't accept funded hours anymore, then you're either out of work to care for your child (further impact) or scrabbling trying to find a more expensive place.

You don't win by not paying for the things your child uses while they're there.

I don't know the ins and outs of the nursery's finances. We're already paying over £100 a day for non funded hours, so I resent paying a top up fee too when the government says this clearly isn't allowed.

I don't want to cause any trouble though... no idea what other parents are going to do.

Exactly!
We need more state funded childcare options that cover wraparound care
and more infrastructure built to implement this. More women can then afford to return to work and continue their career and families won’t be spending a massive proportion of their income on childcare. This will be good for the economy and an investment for the future as the low birth rate is a ticking time bomb.

Some of the chain nurseries are making huge profits with bank accounts held offshore.

OP - look up the landmark ruling on nursery fees - this is why the nursery is having to ask for more money instead of charging you directly:
https://www.localgovernmentlawyer.co.uk/governance/396-governance-news/59965-high-court-judge-rejects-legal-challenge-by-council-over-ombudsman-report-in-nursery-fees-case

Ok so here’s another way of looking at it. Our charity run setting has just cut the hours of all staff due to this change. The mandatory fee was used for snacks, drink - some kids have special diets so particular snacks were catered to at a higher cost, messy play resources, flour etc for playdough etc etc.
We are all paid minimum wage (despite some being highly qualified).
This is causing lots of excellent staff to look for other work.
I just wish the new system was for private run nurseries and not charity run ones. It’s incredibly difficult for these fantastic settings to stay open.