AIBU or is nursery.....?

[OggOgg]

DS is 3 and has a year round place funded by early years 15 hours.

The nurse is closed on bank holiday Mondays yet our funding is paid and he can't go. I think this is a bit shit, I can't think of many other businesses that could operate like this but hey ho...

So the week before last I got a voucher in DS's bag. It had his name on it and was an 'in lieu' voucher offering an extra day due to the upcoming bank holiday. I called to book him in on the Wednesday as our 'in lieu' day and was told that was fine.

Our bill arrived and we had been charged for the extra day. I called the manager and explained we had a voucher and had called and told it was fine to book him in. She said both had been a mistake, he wasn't entitled, if I'd checked the T&C's I'd know that and there was nothing she could do, we'd have to pay...

She then added that because we hadn't handed our voucher in we couldn't have the day anyway, that all vouchers had to be handed in or it was invalid. I found the voucher and it simply states hand in at time of booking, which we did over the phone!

He loves the nursery but I'm really annoyed by this, aibu?

My DD got two nursery sessions in lieu in May for the bank holiday hours missed. They just asked me to pop in to the reception & book them in (as they had to make sure there was space on the days I wanted.)

I would absolutely complain x

They should honour it. Their mistake. Ofsted won't get involved

The free funding is 570 hours per year.

15 hours is term time only.

Some places let you stretch the offer so 12 hours a week year around 47 weeks per year assuming closure for holidays

They took the booking in error and subsequently cannot fulfil the contract. Therefore they either cancel the booking and return the money or honour the original agreement.

While it of course isn't okay to charge you for the day, when you've been told it's free, I don't understand this voucher-thing. Obviously the nursery will be closed on a holiday - why would it need to offer another day instead?

You could threaten to do a ‘sad face’ story in the daily mail.... or the equivalent on the local Facebook page.

Ask for the contact details of the provider & take it up with them. I wouldn't being paying them anything extra to cover that day.

I have worked in nurserys for almost 10 years and i have a 2yr old and 3yr old who are both in nursery and I find this very odd. You are not being unreasonable at all. The manager seems totally unprofessional!
I would complain following the nurserys procedure but would make it very clear that you are prepared to take it to LADO (local authority designated officer) every council has one and is the highest point you can go to with a complaint (obvs without getting courts involved, which seems a bit extreem). Good luck (sounds like the manager needs a bit of standing up to! And also kids are very adaptable and going from.experience I'm confident that if you had to move him to another nursery he would love it just as much. You need to feel happy about where your child is)

LADO will only deal with Safeguarding issues.

Is the nursery a chain of nurseries with a head office? Take it further if that's the case. If the nursery is owned and managed by the same person the only thing you can do next is to contact the local authority, the Early Years Team or Funding department and explain the situation.

You need the complaints procedure.

Follow the policy to the letter.

Ofsted will have no interest in this.

Slightly surprised that a nursery worker of 10 years would suggest LADO.... hope you weren’t the safeguarding lead!

Crikey I hope the LADO referral was a mistake

Can you clarify on the funding issue? Is your son getting 15 hours term time only? Or do you qualify for 30 hours and you are just using 15 hours all year round?

It sounds to be like the voucher was a mistake as it should only have been given to paying parents. Your funded hours are unlikely to have included a bank holiday.

they said the voucher was given in error and that when I called they also made a mistake in telling me I could have the extra day!

Their error should be at their cost, not yours.

I wouldn't be paying for it, it just seems ridiculous especially as you mentioned the voucher at the time if booking the extra day, absolutely no chance would I pay.

Be firm, they made the error twice! It hasn't even cost them anything to have your son bar food! I would offer to cover his food/snack costs but they clearly had a space on the Wednesday otherwise they wouldn't have let you book him in.

Another shocked that a nursery worker thinks a LADO is interested in a contractual dispute! I suggest @Mrseasmith goes and has a good read of her settings safeguarding policy and probably a good idea to redo the safeguarding training too, to make sure it’s all clear in your head.
Ofsted won’t be bothered about this either, they don’t get involved with money issues.
Op, have you only spoken verbally about this issue with the staff at the nursery? Might be worth setting it out in a letter to make sure your point is really clear, but In the end, do you want to create an atmosphere at the nursery? You can either forget the whole thing and move on or fight it and end up loosing all trust in an otherwise good setting.
I lean towards that they should honour their offer. They made the mistake giving you the voucher and then another mistake letting you book a day they knew you were paying for with the voucher, so they should let it go and honour the voucher. And be more careful about this kind of thing in the future.