Nursery have used funded hours to repay furlough money

[KittyKat1983]

Hi, just after a bit of advice if anyone knows where I stand with this. My DD was due back at nursery next week as I am going back to work. She gets 30 hours funded by the government which I have been renewing all through lockdown and she hasn’t attended since March. The nursery are now saying we will have to pay for her place as they have used the funded hours to repay the furlough money they claimed off the government. Does anyone know if they can actually do this? It’s left me stuck because I can’t afford to pay the full rate so won’t be able to return to work. Thanks in advance.

@jellyandiscream

Hi I work for a preschool and we were told to use funding to pay wages as normal. If they have claimed furlough and received funding that is where the problem lies. so they have in fact claimed off the government twice if that makes sense for furlough and funding?

I don't think this is the issue.

OP has paid for a certain number of hours on top of the govt. funded 30 hours.

Nursery has agreed to average bills across the year. This means that in term time she has paid for some hours which are already funded by government. In effect she has been paying in advance for holiday childcare when government funding is not available.

The furlough/government funded hours clusterfuck is awful and nurseries have been treated atrociously but this is for them to sort out with the government.

Has OP had all the hours of childcare she has already paid for out of her own pocket?

Long story short, funding was paid regardless of whether the child attended or not.
Government said providers don't have to repay or owe hours.
Government then said they were takimg back furlough money to the value of any funding paid, the funding payments will basically cover the furloughed wages instead.
As many settings are already offering funding at a loss this has literally pushed them over the edge.

@LangClegsInSpace Has OP had all the hours of childcare she has already paid for out of her own pocket?

The OP doesn’t actually mention paying for hours. Just that the 30 hours are normally spread across the year.

The issue is that she expected whatever proportion of free hours used each week to be spread through the summer holidays to reduce, or nil, her bill.

If she has paid for hours then you could be onto something, but it’s unlikely the nursery won’t have thought of that. Especially has the OP didn’t mention paying during the months her child wasn’t there so won’t have built up a reserve of funds

Has OP had all the hours of childcare she has already paid for out of her own pocket?

And what payment were the nursery asking for during closure (if any)

Trying to back these calculations out is a bloody nightmare. Providers were also specifically told to use February to calculate their average private vs government income so if the stretched funding is a provider agreement (i.e. they receive the funding in term times then stretch it, rather than it being stretched by the council, I think the former is normally the case) then they will have had to base their furlough claim proportion on unstretched income.

@lyralalala cross posted but you're probably right in that OP hasn't mentioned top ups.

I don’t mean to be rude but you’ve paid nothing for 4 months. I wouldn’t expect them to be claiming 30 hours, use 22 & then still ‘save’ the other 8 for your return, considering you weren’t paying anything during that period, and considering no one had a clue when that return may be, if at all.

Most nurseries were just trying to stay afloat & not go under, with no good guidance from the Gov.

Whether it’s correct or not, there’s only 5 weeks left. Just suck it up & pay, or send her less hours that you can afford. Or don’t send her back at all.

OP, unless you continued to pay nursery fees during lockdown when the nursery was closed, I would agree with the above with bells on. Nurseries will simply go under if you want your cake and eat it.

As a corollary, I continued to pay private school fees (with a 10% discount) during schools were closed even though the teaching was much reduced. I get that there is no option of remote childcare in the case of nurseries but I am also aware that if I did not continue to pay school fees, there won't be much of a school for my dcs to go back to. I cannot imagine nurseries would be in any better financial position, in fact probably worse. Unless parents share some of the financial pain of the nursery, there will be much reduced choice of early years childcare overall because childcare settings with simply close.

Did you manage to get this resolved with your nursery @KittyKat1983?