To think it’s actually really unfair to be charged for bank holidays at nursery?

Usually these nurseys are owned by very wealthy people. In an ideal world the owners would pay out of thier considerable profits .Even though it would cost them a lot. I expect they make a large enough profit to afford to pay even half.. I understand your rant/vent. Unfortunately, it is what it is.

Agree. It’s ridiculous. My childminder does not charge for days she isn’t working,

I financial model as part of my job so yes I’m more than capable of doing the “math” thanks for asking. Given that cash management will be very important to a nursery, rolling up chances into prices over a 12 month period/cycle to account for specific dates in a completely different cycle will become quite difficult for them to do. Managing it this way aligns their cash in and their cash out far better/cleaner (by cash I mean payments, it’s a turn of phrase in cash you can’t figure it out). They most likely have basic bookkeeping services and someone simply doing their accounts so won’t have a full cash management approach. Happy to build you an excel model explaining it if that helps.

Interestingly my friend who works in a nursery doesn't get paid for bank holidays. She either loses a days pay or is forced to take it as annual leave.

Exactly. I do not understand why this is the customer's cost to bear. It never affected us as we didn't use or need childcare at that stage, but as employers we pay our staff for bank holidays and that is part of the cost of employing staff.

Difference is you have the option of driving or going to the gym. In this scenario you don't have the option to use the childcare you've paid for. And often have to pay for another lot on top as you need to work

No she hasn't, she answered saying she doesn't

I was never charged for bank holidays, not all nurseries do. I would have been annoyed too tbh.

Most nurseries are in crisis not making huge profits if the government pay £5 per hour per child how can there be a huge profit when you look at staffing ratios, additional staff, rent, electricity, food costs, consumable costs etc. ?

How would they raise prices to cover it if the government had come along and cut the prices by 25% and said you can only increase prices on chocolate and alcohol but if the customer wants to they can add their own to the shopping bag for free and you deliver it ....essentially nurseries are now not allowed to charge extra for anything needed to provide the eyes and and extras must be voluntary and they can't insist on additional hours.

Edited to add into my post above

I totally get it. If I sent my kids to nursery every Tuesday. I would pay for 52 days childcare and recieve 52 days childcare.

but if my child went to nursery every Monday; I’d pay for 52 days childcare and only recieve 48 days childcare

28 days leave is 5.6 weeks.

That is exactly what I have just said.

Some employers state it differently (eg break out the bank holidays), but it still has to add up to the same.

Just to edit - maybe it's the way I have worded it.

What I mean is it doesn't have to be the actual bank holidays, but it has to add up to the same amount.

Well that's not entirely true. I get 28 leave days and no bank holidays. This is in the private sector.

Every job I've ever had has been the same. We used to get paid time and a half on a bank Holiday but that's a thing of the past now.

In the UK?
You are entitled to a minimum of 5.6 weeks paid annual leave per year (pro rata for part time) this includes bank holidays, so some people get it broken down onto 4 weeks annual leave plus 8 days bank holiday.
Others just get it rolled up into one lump of 5.6 weeks.

Companies are of course allowed to give above the statutory minimum. But they cannot give less.

I don't understand this, for Bank Holidays I HAVE to take it as annual leave, so I'm paid but it's out of my leave entitlement. Surely that's a better way to do it?

I work in a term time, committee run, not for profit setting, we don't get paid for bank holidays.
No idea if the parents get charged for bank holidays tho.

By evening out all the actual open days across payments.
So in a month with one bank holiday there might be 21 open days.
All parents pay 1/21 of the running costs per child for each day they book.
All staff get 1/31 of the month's pay per day.

My issue was always that I've never had to pay for a service on days that the service provider isn't open. However, child care is the only service that this doesn't apply to for some stupid reason.

Yes the staff should be paid for BHs, out of the overall fees received and not charge their customers for days they aren't open.

Ooooh, I've never been told off on MN before. Are you feeling all important now?

RTFT... smh

You don't begrudge the staff their paid holiday entitlement OP, so really what you're unhappy about is that you're specifically billed for a BH? The alternative is to not charge for a bank holiday and instead increase the daily rate to cover holiday pay for the staff. If you're not objecting to them being paid then surely it's irrelevant how it's broken down and invoiced?

If you care to read the op's replied properly, you will see that she has indeed answered this question. 🤦‍♀️