Nursery- service charge to bring a packed lunch

[strongagain1985]

AIBU to be surprised that the nursery (attached to a primary school) my 4 year old dd attends, charges £1.75 for children to bring a packed lunch in? If the child has a school dinner then it's £2.75. What do you make of this?

*not miss

Your entitlement to 15 hours is broken into 3 hour sessions.

If the sessions are say 9 - 12 and 12.30- 3.30, the lunchtime supervision is additional and has to be paid for .

If you are saying your 3 hour session is 9 -12 and 12 - 3 and they are trying to charge you for 12.00 - 12.30 for instance then you have grounds for querying the charge.

At DS's nursery I think the free sessions are 9-12 and 12-30-3.30. If you want your child to stay over lunch you have to pay for that 30 minutes - about £2 I think - and either bring a packed lunch or pay for school dinner.

If you want the hours completely free there is the option to do 5 mornings or 5 afternoons.

It sounds grim. And not sure they are allowed to do this if it's run by the Local Authority.

Thanks for clarifying. It just surprised me as I don't remember anything like this when I was younger. As it is a primary school they also charge the primary school kids the same. For school I thought the dinner ladies were paid a wage and it was their job to supervise at lunchtime? I must be behind with the times

It's common for local authority nurseries here if you choose to take your hours over a lunch time Viviennemary - they only get 15 hours funding so lunch staff have to be paid.

No extra hours over the entitlement taken.

Though you have not said exactly how many free education hours have been allocated.

That is the key information here I feel, as you seem to be thinking that 9am-3.25pm x 2 = all free entitlement as less than 15 hours. It doesn't in my view. At best it equals 12 hours, 50 minutes but it could easily be 12 hours, leaving you with 50 minutes to pay.

So I feel you need to get the number of funded hours per week clarified, then take things from there.

Children who are in FT funded education should not be charged for taking in a packed lunch!

And actually when DS was at pre-school, they never charged me for him to eat his packed lunch because it was the same staff who covered lunch - there was no separate 'dinner lady' system because it was only 30 mins (or 25 mins in your case).

Mine was a private pre-school though. You may want to see if the private pre-schools charge

Yes, the dinner ladies are paid a wage.

However, there is only so much money in the pot! Certainly, the kitchen staff need to be paid for out of school dinner money as they wouldn't be there if it wasn't for children having school dinners. Outside contractors usually do the dinners and charge a set price for food and catering staff, presumably they make this the same for the nursery children.

Lunchtime supervisors- the ones who watch the children eat and on the playground- are paid out of school funds and I think funding depends on the number of children on roll. Nursery children won't count for the purposes of funding, only full time pupils, which explains why the parents need to pay some towards lunchtime supervision.

The nursery is also usually a separate building/unit, and the children not allowed to mix with the school children, which means you need more staff to go round. As an extreme example, if there was one child staying for lunch you would need 1 member of staff to supervise (though 2 would be preferable in case of emergency/protection from allegations on both sides). If that 1 child was on the playground with all the other children, you wouldn't need any more staff as the ratio would probably still be met.

As for not remembering stuff when you were younger, for a start you weren't entitled to as many as 15 hours free. And it wasn't as flexible as today. If I remember correctly, it used to be 12.5 hours per week, and school nurseries offered you a morning or afternoon place.

Oddfodd- the OP's child is PT not FT.

CrohnicallySick, thanks for taking the time to post but you come across as arsey. The school are quite poor at explaining things and then get offended if you try to ask questions.

Are you allowed to run back to back sessions? Our preschool the sessions are 9-12 and 12-3. No extra charge for staying over lunch. You can opt for your child to do 9-1 and pay £4 for the extra hour.

They probably have to employ an additional lunchtime worker, plus allocate a share of cleaning costs, overheads etc.

The cost seems a bit high, but if it is for half an hour it is prob based on the £3.50 per hourly rate that the govt. funds for the preschool sessions.

I've never heard of this, but I've never heard of anyone in a State nursery having the entitlement in full days. All the schools I have worked in or visited you choose morning or afternoon and then if you wish pay for the other session.

she is saying that they charge the whole school, not just nursery children though!! So the hours thing there is irrelevant!

my son attended the school nursery he did 2 and a half days and no charge for lunch. I've worked in primary schools for years and never heard of this!

Our state school nursery did away with afternoons the year my son started Reception and now offer mornings or 2 and a half days only.

Nurseries and pre schools are running on a shoestring at the moment, they really are.

This nursery isn't trying to fleece you, it's trying to keep itself viable.

At my children's previous school school dinner was £3.50 per day per child but if you brought in a packed lunch you had to pay £1.50 per child per day.

DS goes to nursery for 10 hours on one day and 5 on another - the nursery we use let you choose whether you want 3 x 5 or 5 x 3 hour sessions to make up the 15 hours.

He has a packed lunch both days and its never been suggested that I pay extra for it

I missed the bit about the school charging the same, I read it as the school dinner price being the same as nursery (sorry, when I'm tired I find it hard to process things correctly).

My comments about paying for lunchtimes at nursery still stand, however as oddfodd said they shouldn't be charging school pupils, the money for lunchtime supervision should come out of the school budget.

They charge the primary school kids?

Unlikely this is allowed. Schools can't charge for something that is compulsory.

Try googling the school name and 'charging policy', most schools have the policy available online.

I can see why it would sting & they really should take the time to explain clearly why they are charging you.

DS3 does 9.30 - 2.30 three days a week, taking in a packed lunch. I do not pay for the lunch period as it is in his 15 hours.

Our school runs a lunch club especially for nursery and it costs extra, but it is an additional childcare facility. Our nursery sessions are mornings 8.30am - 11.30 or afternoons 12.30 - 3.30. To make it easier for parents who are working or need additional childcare, and to facilitate the transfer between other childcare providers we set up lunch sessions. Some morning children stay on and some afternoon children come early, before their 12.30 start time. We can provide a hot lunch from the main school's kitchens or children can bring their own packed lunch. But which ever they select additional supervision needs to be funded. Nursery is not main school where the children are full time and lunch cover is part of the educational "package", so to expect it for free is not reasonable.

Just looked online and they have a school prospects and under the Charging and Remissions section they only state the cost of the school meals nothing about the charge to bring a packed lunch in.