Unused childcare vouchers

[Noideawhatusername]

Posting here for traffic. We made a mistake and over saved in the childcare voucher scheme and still have a significant amount on the account. We don’t have any childcare needs as I am a SAHM and children are 11 years old. How can I use this money? I know I can book them onto some holiday camps. Is there anything else I can use them for?

Some after school actual clubs might take them if Ofsted inspected - so an interest club that happens after school rather than being for childcare per se.

I'd assume a few holiday camps would blow through them pretty quickly though.

Have you tried getting an refund? Some providers will but some are finicky about it.

There might be some holiday activities that take them - stagecoach do for instance, my daughter does a summer workshop with them every year.

I used to love holiday camps to break up the long holidays as a child

PGL holidays took them as payment from me a couple of years ago. I had £900 worth. I also spent some on a tutoring course.

Didn’t know Stagecoach took childcare vouchers, thank you will have a look. Yes I agree, think children are too old for ‘normal’ holiday camps. Will also look into getting a refund too as quite a lot of money. Thank you for your replues.

Does your 11 year old need a tutor. My dds has a tutor that also does childcare and is happy to take vouchers as payment as she takes them for some of the childcare she provides.

Swimming lessons?

That’s a good idea. Maybe I’ll keep them for when they need tutors （likely at least for French as we can’t help with that at all). Thank you.

We got ours refunded with a £30 admin fee and then yiu pay the tax. Dippy husband forgot to stop direct debit. Was still worth it though

Not all tutors will take them, and I imagine over time the amount will reduce as the voucher schemes are closed to new sign ups now and will become less and less the norm as the tax free childcare takes over.

Sports holiday camps might take them rather than ‘childcare’ type camps. My DS does tennis camp in the holidays so I’m using mine up this way (tennis coach gives me 25% off as DS has lessons so it’s slow going!)
Just make sure you use them occasionally as my DHs were left in account for 3 years while I used mine up and they gave them to charity a couple of days before I asked DH to give me the details so I could book tennis camp! £750 worth!! Got them back!