Ski trip cost- are we subsidizing “host “ family

My post probably didn’t come across as intended. My point is by making the kids pay for the adult parents, they’re acting like teachers. It’s a business transaction where they get the kids friends to pay for their holiday.

They are taking the piss and should have outlined the terms and cost right at the start if they wanted to play it like this.

If I was the parent I would paying for the accomodation etc. for everyone and maybe only ask the kids to pay for their own ski tickets. but that’s me.

I auppose it also depends what stage Op is at if the family have said this is the cost plus flghts then fine - take it or leave it.

If flights have been booked and the accommodation costs have doubled from first discussed then Op is right to ask questuons.

Silly comparison. The teacher is there on a school trip as part of their job. They shouldn’t have to pay. Sadly parenting is unpaid. The friend’s parents are acting as PARENTS, not teachers, not instructors, not nannies, but parents.

Edited for error.

You can communicate how you like, but I would be really offended to get a message that sounds like a business transaction and/or that you're accusing them of ripping you off in this situation. And I wouldn't want to send my child on holiday with someone I'd offended.

Its not comparable to a school trip. School trips its one adult to about 10 kids.
This is one adult to 3 kids

this?

Does OP think that on school trips the teachers pay to go or the kids all contribute?

Surely must be a typo?

Overall £££ sounds right if that covers food / travel etc but if your child is sharing accommodation costs then your share is only £500 ie 4,000 divided by 8. Plus your lift pass. Total £800

tbh I would not want my 15yo going on a ski trip with so few adults. Only 1 adult on the mountain? are they getting a ski guide or doing lessons?
And why an extra 4 kids? 2 friends each?

if they are all excellent skiers then I’m sure it will be great. At least for the right price.

It might be about right as the full cost of a skiing trip, but basic maths tells you it's not about right as a 1/8th share of a £4000 chalet and a £300 lift pass, which is what OP thinks she's paying for

If I was inviting DC friends on a holiday I would pay for it. I have done this several times, albeit not skiing.

Also, so she can work out how expensive the trip is and whether it is good value. It's a lot of money to spend without understanding what is being paid for.

Having spent years skiing with kids in the holidays I think the total cost is probably about right. I would ask politely what is included so you know what else you might need to pay for. Then decide what you think. Food on the mountain is usually eye wateringly expensive. I used to give my teens about 40 euros each a day to feed themselves and we still provided a big meal every night.

But this is’t a school ski trip where they are staying in some crappy dorm somewhere. It’s a family skip trip.

Including flights I always budget around £2k per person for our family of 4. So £1,600 without flights sounds reasonable.

There are some quite extreme extrapolations taking place on this thread.

The only way to get to the bottom of it is to politely ask what the money is paying for and how it's been calculated.

Sounds to me that this family wanted a ski holiday they can't afford and decided to save on accommodation costs by shoving in 4 more kids into the apartment and instead of paying full price pay just a fraction. They should still be covering half as there is 4 of them, but they seem to count every kid who is not their family as an entire separate family - which just confirms that they are looking at the extra kids as extra wallets and not people.
I would absolutely not be sending my child with them, and the money reason wouldn't even be the first on the list. I would be really worried if they will supervise properly. It is a dangerous sport and these people didn't include your kids because they like them or because they want to include them, but simply because they needed you to chip in with money. Horrible.

I'd cover the cost of food and accomodation if one of my kids' friends came along but would probably ask them to pay their own travel, and for their own kit if skiing.

It genuinely looks to me like the host family is taking the piss here. If it's £1600 just for a (shared) room and lift pass, with everything else on top, then that's a LOT.

I would not hesitate to ask for an itemised breakdown of costs.

Yes Im afraid people do sometimes try to sneak additional costs in to their own advantage. Some time back I made a verbal agreement with my NDN to share costs for a new fence. She undertook to get the costings and I told her up front that I would need to see sight of intemised receipts with VAT on a letterhead. I knew she was thinking of having more work done and was determined I was only covering half of the actual cost of the fence. Well she hired a gang of cash in hand cowboys and they put in a patio for her as well as the fence. The resulting fence was made from odd recycled panels and looked like something from the third world. And of course there were no invoices so I refused to pay until I saw some official paperwork. Ended by having my own fence put in alongside.

What about everything else?

Flights/transfers
Food including lunches and drinks
Ski hire
Boot hire
Helmet hire
Ski lessons
Assuming you are providing insurance and spending money

Also I don’t know where people are getting that the father will be supervising all 6 teenagers. I can’t see that in the OP. For all we know they are all doing their own thing all day.

Yes it looks like a bit of a piss take from host family.

FWIW, whenever my kids have been lucky enough to be invited on holiday as a guest of their friends' families, the host family has always covered the whole thing! I have always offered to pay a share of costs but have always been refused!

Perhaps we have some unusually generous families around us, but this seems to be the norm when you are taking your own kids' friends on holiday with you.

In this case, if the host family wanted guests to pay, they should have explicitly said 'we are organising a ski trip and would love your DC to join us if possible, we've worked out it will cost £xyz per child' BEFORE any firm plans were made!

Insane how many people go in all guns blazing for what might be a typo, a parent being bad at maths or a misunderstanding about the costs when initially discussed (they could have two adjoining apartments, for example, and have only quoted the non-family apartment price in initial discussions).

Me also.

It's almost certainly a misunderstanding of what's covered - either OP is assuming she's paying separately for things the hosts have already factored in, or the OP is oblivious to some of the costs of a ski trip.

But I still want to know the details!

OP definitely needs to know what all the costs will be (from landing at nearest airport to arriving back there for the return flight), and which of them are covered by this advance payment, so she knows how much additional spending money her DC needs during the trip. She should couch her enquiry in these terms.

Yeah that's the spare change in my pockets right now. I'll probably just give it to a homeless person outside Waitrose.

I know. I am weirdly invested in this one and I feel we're never going to find out what the host family is actually including in that figure! Or why the OP didn't ask from the start how much the trip was likely to cost her! I'd never just agree to send my son anywhere without knowing how much I'd have to pay for it!