30 hours free childcare and redundancy

[Cindy1802]

I have just been made redundant and had a horrible thought - we will now also lose our 30 hours free childcare. We can't take our 3YO out of nursery as it's over subscribed in our area and we will lose his place. What a blooming nightmare.

I am also on maternity leave, upcoming on 9months meaning that I will receive my last payment in September, and that is also the date i will be officially made redundant. However as you are legally able to be on maternity for 12 months, and I was planning on taking the full year anyway, when would I lose the 30 free hours? In September when I am redundant, or in December after 12 months of Mat leave? And is there a grace period?

For 3 yos the 30/15 hrs are universal (i was a sahm when DD was at preschool) so you wont lose your place. Sorry to hear about your redundancy

I think the 30 hours are for working parents so his entitlement will drop down to 15 hours which makes quite a difference, especially when living on 1 salary!

I believe there is a 3 month grace period. I faced this a couple of years ago when I was also on maternity with my second. Ds stayed in nursery for his 2 days for the 7 weeks it took me to officially start a new job.

Sorry this has happened to you. On the redundancy side, suggest you double check this website for information www.acas.org.uk/redundancy-protection-for-pregnancy-and-new-parents

There’s usually a grace period til you have to reconfirm so I think you’ll get the 30 hours til Christmas at least. Fingers crossed you find another job by then.

There is an exemption for maternity leave but you won't be on maternity leave after your redundancy date. You will lose it when you reconfirm if you don't have a job secured then which will take you over the earning limit for the 3 month period.

It's possible though, depending on earnings, that you could reconfirm in October, have the next 3 month period at October - January, and earn enough from starting a job in December. So you do have some time to get a new job confirmed.

The threshold is expected earnings of 183 per week over the three months, 16 hours of national minimum wage, so eg if you started a job part way through the 3 months but were FT, or earning a lot more than minimum wage you could be fine.

There is a grace period so hopefully 3 months will be enough to find something else, if not it will drop to 15 hours

The grace period isn't always 3 months, it will depend on your reconfirmation date. When is this?

To be fair to the government, they seemed to consider this could happen to people and so as people have said there is a grace period which is normally until the end of the term, meaning you may well be covered until the end of December. Obviously they knew people couldn’t be taking their children out of nursery all the time and then restarting them as it would be very unsettling for them.
Sorry to hear this has happened-
I would-check the date when you need to reconfirm asap and start looking for
jobs as once the grace period has ended, you will certainly lose your additional 15 hours per week and be left with the universal 15.
Another thing to consider is if you want to return to work? If not, then maybe 15 hours universal is enough childcare for you?
Good luck.

@SneakerShoulders my reconfirmation deadline is 7th October. Does this mean my grace period is 3 months from then?

Thank you for this info. So just to clarify, I will no longer be technically on maternity leave as of 5th sept (redundancy date), even though if I hadn't been made redundant, I would still be on mat leave and earning £0 until December, and therefore still eligible for 30hours free? This is the frustrating bit!!

Yes, because you're no longer employed. You can double check with HMRC but I've been in a similar situation last year and this is what I was told. I did get another job after a couple of weeks though anyway so it didn't apply.

I would also speak to the employment lawyer you used as this could have formed part of the agreement (IE consideration of it ending your mat leave)?

My understanding is that, on 7 Oct you will have to confirm that you'll earn more than £2380 in the period 7 Oct - 7 January. I would check with HMRC directly though.

Is there any scope with your current employer to tweak the redundancy date, given your mat leave?

Hi, I am in a similar situation. I am being made redundant whilst on mat leave. I negotiated the redundancy to finish when my mat leave finishes on 19th May 2026 (taking full year off) so I could still get free childcare for my 2 year old (redundancies were made Aug 2025).
I have a new job lined up to start in September 2026 but was hoping I could still get the funded hours until September given you have to reconfirm by 12th May. I did this and they have written back asking how much I will earn in the next 3 months.
I will get a redundancy package end of May but I'm guessing this won't be classed as earnings and not sure if I will be allowed a grace period to cover me until September.
Does anyone know?