To expect pre-school to sort out childcare during holidays

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My toddler will be eligible for 30 free hours' childcare from September. We have two options for pre-school: one at the primary school near us and one at the private nursery he goes to now. It's great that they offer this, but the only problem is that both do not have any childcare cover during holidays. My husband and I both work and do not get enough holidays to cover 13 weeks; plus, it would be nice if all of us could be off at the same time!

Holiday clubs etc. do not cater for three-year olds and we do not have any family that could look after our child for a whole day. My sister lives abroad and says their pre-school offers paid childcare all year round. AIBU to think that it's ridiculous that pre-schools are not sorting out cover during school holidays? What are we supposed to do?!

Not sure why the OP is getting so much ridicule for wanting the system to help working parents more.

The state should do more to help parents afford childcare so they can choose to continue their careers. It's a few years when the childcare costs are crippling and they could do with some help. Then they keep up their careers, paying tax, pension contributions etc.

The only places I found that accept the 30 hours funding straight up with no compulsory additional charges are the pre school nurseries attached to schools which only offer term time. All the private nurseries and childminders charged extra fees on top as they can't meet their costs and make a profit on the government hourly rate. Some childminders are reluctant to accept the funding as there is so much admin.

The parents I know who are choosing the preschools are all sahm, or a small number who are teachers themselves or have extensive family support for holiday care. And most of the sahms aren't planning to find work in those hours as it is only 9-3 so not long enough to commute and work. Some of the preschools don't offer wraparound care. There are no options for holiday care. So these government funded pre schools don't help the majority of working families.

We have kept our 3 year old with her Childminder who accepts the funding, but have to pay extra as she charges more than the government levels for an hour (understandably), have to pay for holidays and I've had some criticism from sahm mum friends that I'm holding her back by not sending her to preschool, that she won't be getting the benefits of early education, that she will be bored. It's v frustrating as preschool would be impossible with working hours and normal holiday allowance.

If one of the aims of the scheme is to help with childcare costs then it needs to be designed to actually meet the needs of most families.

Not sure why the op is getting such criticism for pointing out that there is limited childcare provision for families where both parents work.

If your current nursery only offers full time up to when they're 3 then you have to find a nursery for him that offers full time until he's 5. Most private nurseries do, unless I'm much mistaken. I find it strange you didn't check this when he first went to his current nursery.

Do you realise just how selfish that sounds?
Your child is your responsibility. Why should the state have to look after it every day except when you choose to be available?

Given that the 30 hours is intended to help both parents stay in work, it's not totally unreasonable to question the ways in which the term-time delivery model works against both parents working.

Are we not allowed to question or criticise government policy if it's related to childcare? Do you realise just how ridiculous that sounds?

Private nursery are usually open 50 weeks (ish) a year and cater for 4months to 5 years old.

Pre-schools and nurseries attached to primary schools are term-time and usually cater for 3-4 year olds.

All of them offer free hours for 3 year olds term time only.
All of them "teach" the same things.

Generally a full time working parent will send their child to private nursery then full time school.
Generally parents who are at home or work term time only opt for pre-schools/nurseries attached to schools. Some parents will use a childminder on top of pre-school to pick up and cover holidays etc

There is no academic advantage to either.
If the child is likely to go to a certain primary school then they have the advantage of recognising others in the same boat but this advantage is very short term.

I think it's fine having a mixture. Some people work full time and need long hours. Others are happy with the shorter hours. It would be strange for pre-schoolers to have pre-school and older kids to be off. 😂

I would say, op, what have you been doing to cover the nursery holidays up until now?

If the 30 hours was full-time then I think that demand for private nurseries who accepted free hours would rise and parents who needed more than 30 hours would find it harder to get places. A rise in demand would lead to even higher childcare prices.

My understanding was that a lot of places that accepted the 15 hours struggled as the money refunded by the government did not equal their costs. My youngest is at primary so I'm well past this stage but have these problems been ironed out?

The pre-school next to the primary school my dcs went to opens 7:45-18:00 fifty weeks a year. There are no tops ups on the fifteen/soon to be thirty hours, they are free at the point of use.

Like treacle we don't get 30 free hours here (Northern Ireland) all nursery hours are paid for working parents, the pre-school nurseries do the same holidays as the primary schools as they are often attached to that school, but the private nurseries do run through the holidays.

I thought this message was the OP being Sarcastic and chuckled, but realised it was sadly true.

I'm wondering what the OP plans to do when Darling children start school? Send them to Boarding school?

Pre-school's run by the Council run to 'Term-Time' only - Gosh, how will you manage? You must be the only parent who has this issue.

There are MANY people who do not have the luxury of Family helping to look after the children - My Mother is dead, my Dad lives 200 miles away. My Hubby's Parents both still work themselves so cannot help out.

So we book Annual leave off work and do swapsies with friends who are in the same boat.

Did you not think about any of this when you DECIDED to have children?

Very odd.

OP, as others have said, if you need all year round child care, why did you choose a nursery that does not offer this? You chose to put your DC somewhere where this was not available?

When my own DC was with a childminder it was much easier than when they went to preschool and there was no holiday cover, however I chose to move her to get the free 15 hours, as the childminder couldn't offer this. I could have put her in a nursery that would and that offered year round care, but chose not to for various reasons!

I agree that it is an awful problem in the holidays, and I wish that schools would offer more holiday clubs etc, but the fact is they don't and our children are our responsibility, not theirs

I think it's common knowledge that this isn't provided and if you work you need to sort out childcare. Schools and preschools don't want kids their year round nor do they wish to take responsibility for your child out with school term. You will need to find alternate child care, either another nursery, a child minder or a nanny.

Free preschool childcare or nursery school is a great boon even if not perfect yet. But consider the alternative/how it used to be not very long ago...

I couldn't send my DC to nursery school as needed fullday childcare to cover working. Tbh it didn't seem to make a big difference by the time they started school though I was concerned at the time.
School holidays were a nightmare, more so as a SP. Also had to pay for all childcare then. I would have been thrilled to get the current deal!

I'm still not quite getting it. Why do you have to change to pre school? Does your nursery not do the 30 hours? Ours is a private nursery and we get the 30 hours, we still pay he same fee every month but the 30 hours is deducted across the total amount rather than paying more during term time. When dc go up to pre school nothing changes.

Find a new nursery that offers year round care until Reception? That's what I had to do when my children were younger and I was working.

"I don't know why his nursery is not offering all-year care for three-year olds, with or without deducting free hours."

A lot of term-time settings are term time only because they employ parents who have children at school so the staff accept a very low rate of pay to work there because they are also rewarded with the school holidays off. The 30 hour funding is only enough to be able to afford very low wages (in areas where it is affordable at all).

Does your current nursery not offer funded hours? If not then it is probably for this reason, they couldn't accent the funding rate and still afford the cost of wages that would be enough to recruit staff that would work all year round.

Why can't you keep him in his current nursery? Why does he have to go to pre school? You said in an earlier post you pay for him to go all year round so why not keep him there until reception and forget about pre school?

It might just be his nursery not offering any holiday care when he goes to preschool, but other nurseries might have organised this better

So you find one that does. There will be lots.

As others have said, you are going to have this problem for many many years to come during school holidays. There won't be a nursery option then.

I have never heard of a private nursery that didn't continue to offer full time care and deduct the free hours. You'll need to find another private nursery that provides for your needs.

Why does he have to go to Pre school? My nursery has the children until they start school and do the 30 hours free, so my daughter will be there until school age

This is easy....find a nursery that is open all year round that will accept the 30 free hours and then just pay the extra for your child to go in the holidays. The free hours have always been term time only.

I would assume that unless the school does some sort of holiday club, then it is shut during school holidays
But childcare is something local councils need to sort out, because unless you work in a school, most employers still expect you to work during school holidays!

Why can't he stay at his private all year round nursery when he turns 3?

My ds stayed at his until he was FT at school. So he was there for the first 10 days of reception because back then it was still staggered starts and he's summer born.

Jut to clarify. Your nursery offers year-round care for children up to the age of 3, after which they only offer term-time care until the children leave to go to school?

Presumably other local nurseries aren't so, um, peculiar?

Haven't read through all the thread BUT our local pre-school wont even accept the government vouchers in the afternoons meaning that if I want to send dc there then I can only do so (for free) in the mornings which is even more restrictive and makes it virtually impossible for me to work - they are also only open a couple of afternoons in the week BUT it is a really good pre-school so willing to go along with it for the moment and fortunately (for me) I'm not working and have given up on the idea until dc starts school.
I think this is why some parents opt out of pre-school and choose a nursery type setting or childminder - perhaps more flexibility.

What will you do when he goes to school?