Nursery have increased fees by 10% and we can't afford it.

[Notveryxmasy]

With full time hours that's £100 a month more and we can't afford it. We don't have that money each month. We live rurally, I work from home and DH is a contractor so no one set place of work so DD has to go to a local childcare setting and there just aren't many to choose from at all. Her current nursery by sheer dumb luck is less than a mile down the road; I'd have to drive 6 miles to get to another one by which time the fuel using 24 miles every day would eat up any savings we could possibly make moving her. She's also settled and loves it there, I don't want to disrupt her. No chance of a pay rise as I'm public sector and DH is SE and already doing everything he can to earn what he does.

She currently goes 8-6 as I work 8:30-5. I pick her up by quatre past 5 but the nursery don't do half hours so we have to pay for the full 10 hours. I have sent an email to ask if they will please consider allowing us to drop an hour a day and let her do 8:15 to 5:15 but I haven't heard anything back and I'm not holding out hope. All our bills have increased so much these past few months and we're expecting another baby, we don't have this extra money. What can we do if the nursery refuse to let her drop an hour?

We don't have sky, we don't eat out, we don't have luxuries, I don't even have a smart phone these days as I couldn't afford to replace it when it broke. There's nothing we can cut out to magically find that £100 every month.

You are asking us OP but what was in your original plan to "make it work"?

Surely you anticipated increased costs, sudden emergencies etc so what did "make it work" actually entail?

What was the plan?

@Useranon1

£400 a month for groceries for 2 adults and a toddler is exorbitant! Surely that's where you cut?!

300. And I'm assuming the 2yo still needs nappies etc..

I don’t think your plan was ever really financially feasible in all honesty. You’ve been a bit overly optimistic with the finances as you’ve never really had a buffer from the sums you’ve posted. Nursery is incredibly tight and expensive but you’ll also need to factor in paying for nursery and wrap-around for your first for a period of time. This is something that you’ll need to manage for at least another 4/5 years.

I would do everything you can to not opt out of pension. Your payments will be covered during mat leave and long term it would be costly to opt out.

I’d you can pay by the hour at nursery then that is going to be your best bet. Asking for flex is likely to be better than reducing hours as you don’t really want to reduce your mat pay. You might also be able to use your pregnancy as a reason for requesting flex but likely a short-term solution as won’t help for when you return after mat leave.

So baby due in October, does that mean you will start maternity leave in September? So 6 months to cover i.e. £600. Have you got holiday you can take? Remember it still accrues during ML so you might have 5 weeks this year so you could take September as holiday and save £100 or you could spread it out over the next 6 months so take a days holiday a week if they will agree it and you drop nursery to 3 days a week. I sort of did this in reverse when I went back to work, I had six weeks holiday a year, went back at Christmas so got the bank holidays and had six weeks I carried over to January and I then did half days for January, February and March. It made the return more gentle.

Or could GPs help out in August/September? Come and stay for a week or two so you could finish nursery a few weeks early?

Obviously it depends if work are prepared to be flexible. If you offer them some options e.g. being flexible with finishing time or taking September as holiday it puts the ball in their court as you aren't making demands.

I think you have to try to be a bit creative to work out a way round this. It is difficult but also think of things like selling on ebay, doing surveys (I'm making about £40 a month on prolific which is almost half way there.)

Good luck, don't worry about the "you should have thought about this earlier" I don't think I could have afforded any of mine on paper but we managed and you will too.

@JustWonderingIfYou

Is your nursery really pay per hour? We only have day or half day rates here.

In your situation I'd have her do 4 full days 1 half day. The half day at home would have to be a good long nap, a naughty 2 hours of TV and a good half hour of snacks. It'd be good for her to learn independent play.

We only have council nurseries where I live ....you pay for sessions 9 to 12 and 1 to 4 ( £15 a session) then the wraparound is per hour £4.... 7 to 9 ....4 to 6 ...

You don't have an extra £100 a month, but you're having another child?
That's really irresponsible.
Well, I guess, one of you could get a better job.

I’m so sorry op but I don’t understand your maths or how you thought you could afford this.

You will be about 100 a month better off with pay rise, and you will have 300 spare from the loan, but you need to find at least another six hundred for nursery costs in a year and a half, , and you need to buy things like nappies for your child.

By my maths you’re going to be about two to three hundred pounds a month short and that’s before bill increases.

I think you will need to cut down on food costs and potentially one of you needs to get a second job. You can’t survive without your salary and you can’t afford nursery for the two children,

If Op has to work set hours in this role then one option is to apply for another role in nhs - even if it’s a sideways move to another job same band if it has flex hours it’s worth it. She’s got a degree and will have transferable skills.

What do you expect her to do about it now she's pregnant though?

Learn from this to make better decisions in the future. To realise she needs to be more cut through and realistic before she does something, and not go ahead with things just because 'she really wants to'.

And also maybe someone else will read this and learn too. I see a lot of threads of struggling parents and 2+ children.

Doesn’t look like you can cut much from your outgoings

Tho I will say your council tax is very cheap. I pay £175 a month

I think a second job even delivering takeaways one night - tho guessing fri and sat the better tips

These threads always have a pregnant OP. To be brutally honest, if you don’t have a £100 a month buffer it is horribly irresponsible to have another baby.

If you are currently on 4 days a week can you up this to full time?

Or find a second job for 1 or 2 days to cover your the 1 week day and 1 day at the weekend?

It is tough and you might need to have a drop in family time to get through but you will have to look at different options to make your life work.

How are you going to manage paying for 2 in nursery once your baby arrives? Surely when you go back to work even if your 30 hours kick in you will only have 30 hours over 38 weeks, so you will be paying for a baby and top up for the toddler. I'm not sure what to suggest?? It's awful when 2 parents working ft can't afford to have children, even if you gave up work temporarily you'll be much worse off. Could you move to be near family?

So many people on here seem to have solved the problem of being able to accurately predict when you'll get pregnant! I wish they'd share it with the rest of us.

@Ozanj

How heavy is your workload Fridays? If it’s light then just skip them. When I wfh with 2 yo DS I just switch my camera off during meetings and use a noise cancelling headset so people can’t hear him in the background

FYI they can hear him unless you're muted. But you can't if you've got noise cancelling headphones on!

@HyggeTygge OP said she planned the pregnancy.

Can you investigate if your mortgage allows mortgage holidays ? Or perhaps you can extend the term to lower payments,

There's not much to cut except food costs; I think you possibly could cut a bit there if you have to. Probably not the full £100.

I'd just say that it feels like an employee's market at the moment - ask for exactly the hours you prefer and see what happens.

@ItsReallyOnlyMe if you read the OP's posts, she can't do that as has already had payment holidays during lockdown. They won't grant her another.

Nat west are offer £150 if you switch current account to them. If you and your husband both did that that’s half the six months covered.

Your fuel bill is double ours & there's 4 of us. That's before price hike.

I think a childminder would be cheaper.

Ask work about flexible working. They may agree to something that enables you to use less childcare.

Are you working 4 long days already?

It's difficult as all costs are going up - so everyone has to charge more to stay in business.

How are you going to afford 2 children in nursery ?

You work 4 days bring in £1600 net and pay £865 soon to be £965 childcare.
Your job has some flex if you are 4 days. Have you gone numbers on full time work.
So you need £635 net to be as you are.
Would you be able to easily go back to role after a career break? You might be better working evenings or weekends min wage not paying childcare for a few years but again not to be done lightly may harm career prospects, pension, affect maternity pay eg might need repaying. Again husband could look at swapping to mind children in day and work evenings or weekends instead then pick up his usual job again in a few years.

My second pregnancy was twins...I took out a 10 year bank loan to cover childcare costs full time until 30 hours kicks in - repayments per month are 1/3 the cost of the childcare bill. Twins also on term time only childminder. -means no annual leave together but needs must

Is her 2 year old meant to just see her one day a week ?? Madness. What exactly is the point of having kids if you are never going to see them?

It's not forever though, just a few months. I'd be more worried about OP making herself ill through tiredness though as she is pregnant.

Could you do some science tutoring this Spring/Summer for GCSE/A level kids?
Well paid and sitting down. Plus you already have a DBS check.