Hang on in there until school age doesn't work?

[TwoTimesShoeShop]

Keep seeing similar comments about working with high nursery costs, to keep going and then it gets easier when they're school age.

DC starts school in September. At the moment I pay £297 a month with the 30 free hours for 3 days a week. For 50 weeks a year care, so I don't have to worry about covering any holidays etc. So £3,564 total a year.

I was counting down the days until we'd be better off. But, breakfast and after school club are £18 a day. So £18x3x38 is £2,052 a year. Great, just over half the cost. Except, oh wait, instead of covering two weeks of holiday I need to cover 14. I get six weeks, so does DH. Even if we never have any time off together except bank holidays and weekends (a bit miserable), we have two extra weeks we'd need holiday clubs for, at £65 a day, so £65x3x2 is £390. If we allow ourselves a two week holiday together, that's another £390. So now the annual total is £2,832.

So we're a whole £61 a month better off and only have two weeks annual leave together. If we wanted to take all our annual leave together (as we can now), then the total is £3,612, so more than nursery!

I can't spread my hours over more, shorter days, as I have younger DC. Childminders are more than breakfast and after school club. We don't have anyone else who can do pickups/drop off etc and no family or friends to watch them for a bit.

I'm just not sure why people say that if you can get through the nursery years then you'll be ok once school starts -actually we'd be either worse off financially, or worse off in time together.

I feel like I was on a countdown to September and now the goalposts have moved. Maybe secondary is the real cheaper point?!

AIBU that 'hang on in there until school' as financially it'll be much easier then isn't actually true? Or am I missing something?

Yes, agree with everyone else. You're seem to be in a bizarre area where nursery costs are comparatively low and wrap around and holiday club (in particular) are very high. So, I would suggest that there is probably cheaper wrap around and holiday club available and would recommend shopping about.

We managed this period by working flexibly (one started early, one finished early); child swapping with other parents (which could be ideal for you if you only work 3 days a week). Other parents rely on grandparents to cover odd bits (not an option for us; might be for you).

And yes, we took pretty much opposite holidays to minimise holiday clubs (think we had a week's family holiday together).

Really? At our school there are at least a couple of children in every class who do wraparound every day at both ends. And quite a lot who do after school club every day.

Thank you for this post, OP! I'm glad you're shining a light on this.

With regards to Holiday Club, you need good mum friends so that you can share the burden. On your day off, you take their child so that they don't have to pay for holiday club. On their day off, they take yours. If you plan well, you can probably reduce holiday club to one day a week most holidays that way.

Our DS is 9, year 4. For the last 1-2 years, we've only used holiday clubs when there was something special that DS wanted to do (e.g. a day of Minecraft Coding or Lego Robotics) together with a friend. The rest of the time, he's been at home while we WFH, and entertained himself very well. He had friends over some of the time. He went out for play dates a few times. So it got a lot easier for us.

In Manchester it's about a grand unfunded per week at nursery and London is more than double that. You're comparing the funded years with school wraparound costs which is not what people mean when they say it gets easier.

Also £65 for holiday club is ridiculous. I pay £50 for some kind of highly expensive instructor led outdoor pursuits and watersports clubs. A less exciting sports dance or drama club would be £30 (led by useless teenagers but hey).

Can't the kids have a week with a relative?

Or trade childcare with friends.

Ds2 is year 5 and we don't do holiday clubs much any more.

I'd agree that breakfast and ASC is about that cost. Yours is only slightly more expensive than Manchester pricing. I'd fund a way to cut down by starting work later and skipping breakfast club. It's barely worth it. Join the kids sat outside school waiting for the gates to open!

When people say that, they're talking to people who are paying huge amounts in childcare. As in, over a thousand per child. Usually the parents of tiny ones or those who don't access the full 30 hours funding. We currently pay £970 for three days for our son, a drop to £300 a month WOULD be the "hang on in there" amount you refer to.

While £300 a month is obviously a lot, it's only about six hours a week at minimum wage, so a tiny fraction of the average wage (especially if split with a working partner) and reasonable for childcare imo.

Agree. School was not cheaper. It was also much harder to juggle life when dc started primary school because the hours are completely incompatible with a working week.

dc now going into year 7 and it is EVEN WORSE! There is no breakfast club or after school club, and school finishes at 3. Very limited holiday clubs and those that do exist are very expensive. So yes technically dc is old enough to be left alone for hours at a time and that is what will have to happen if I am going to continue to work. Pretty miserable all round though.

Funded childcare is actually quite a new thing so you may have parents with older kids repeating the rhetoric that it’s much cheaper when they start school simply because that’s how it used to be.

your costs now seem very cheap - ours are teenagers now but we used to pay a fair bit more than that when they were younger.

Sorry to add that when the childcare costs finish, the expensive school trips start.

I think your nursery costs are very low. About 15 years ago, I was paying approx £1k per month on nursery fees in London, so easily £12k a year on childcare when you throw in the odd bit of babysitting here and there.

Before and after school fees (plus summer clubs) were no where near that amount.

If the government helps out so much with nursery fees now that they're a few hundred a month rather than a grand, I'd be pleased if I were you.

I agree. It seems weird how much money the givernment wants to put (admittedly not enough to pay for it, but that’s another issue!) into under 5 childcare when more parents would choose to work part time if they can. But when most parents want to be working more hours there is precious little help.

We've just been discussing this and trying to work out how best to juggle our schedules to use as little childcare as possible.

The free hours being only over term time is really going to cripple us in the summer though as we still have to pay our childminder even if we take a few weeks off with our son (and soon to be second). We only save money if she takes time off.

Sending two kids 8.30-4.30 next year for five weeks will be close to £2k.

This wouldn't necessarily be a problem BUT our mortgage also runs out next summer so we're also going to be paying almost double the amount on that when we re-mortgage 😓

YANBU OP.

I'm in Ireland, so the actual costs and set up aren't relevant as it's quite different here.

But the broad point is the same - I had 3 DC close together so has to pay very high crèche fees (eldest was still in crèche (nursery) when youngest started.

But - these fees were kind of 'it'. I didn't pay extra for food (covered by creche), and their other outgoings like clothes, toys or whatever were minimal.

Once they got a bit older, and I was a single parent, the utter juggling & multiple costs got insane & prohibitive. And they themselves cost more - food, activities, clothes and so on.

Now with 3 teens / nearly teens, childcare itself isn't an issue but the cost of raising teens is far more than what I ever anticipated & much more than even those prohibitive early years

I think the early years / nursery costs are relatively fixed & known, and the challenge as the years go on is the ever-changing nature of costs that can be estimated without being known and often can't be easily reduced (like food costs!)

You're comparing 3days childcare a week to 5 days though

That's why there's not much difference for you

For the families paying for 5 full days of nursery even with 30hrs free then paying 5 days of only wraparound care is going to be much cheaper. Plus as a pp said often they don't need full wraparound care every day so also save that way.

I keep thinking I'm missing something. Gone back to work full time, toddler in nursery nearly 8-9h a day, 5 days per week (though she sleeps 2h of those). I'm thinking I'll work part time when she starts school to help reduce the need for holiday care and wrap around care.

This seems easier to me, as its easy to work full time and have nursery covering long days and a right faff to figure out how to work the 8.30 til 5.15 I do around school hours.

But most people seem to work part time during nursery years and increase hours when they start school. What am I missing?!!!

(Incidentally, full time nursery takes about half my income and I earn somewhat more than my husband, who also works FT)

@Mistralli

It's a long time to step back from your career if you go p/t at school age, especially if you've a few DC.

If that matters, it doesn't to everyone.

They say it because it's financially easier. Logistically tougher, yes, but our childcare bill with halve when youngest goes to school (probably more than halve as we'll move them to the cheaper ASC at school), so that makes the logistics worth sucking up.

But most people seem to work part time during nursery years and increase hours when they start school. What am I missing?!!!

Nursery is more expensive than wraparound, and people want to be with their DC when they're so little. I was ft throughout the nursery years and am contemplating going pt in a few years to facilitate homework, hobbies etc as well as a bit more downtime. Nursery aged DC can have their needs easily met by others but that gets trickier as they get older.

I'm not sure why people are questioning or disputing the cost of wraparound care at school or holiday clubs. My DS last did ASC 4 years ago and it was £13/session then. (I think breakfast club was 4.50) As its attached to the school you can't exactly shop around.

And I've never seen full day holiday clubs for £15, even 10 years ago. £25 used to be the cheapest in our area, and like lots of pps said often they're 10-3 or school hours.

Are you sure all the holiday clubs are £65, OP? Around here the big ones like Barracudas are £65ish, but there are smaller clubs that are much cheaper. Ask around parents with older children - they don't advertise because they don't need to, but you might find something else. There also seems to be much more choice after age 7.

Our school holiday club is £35 but only runs for half the holidays, so I'm always ferreting around trying to find other options. WFH really helps as you can pick up at whatever ridiculous time they deem a full day, but I'm still dreading the juggle over summer and really, really miss being able to take the odd day off for myself to sort my life out or just chill.

I would agree with everyone else that your nursery costs are low. My son's in Reception and last year we were paying £650 for four days at nursery. I know the cost has gone up quite a lot this year too.

Are you sure all the holiday clubs are £65, OP? Around here the big ones like Barracudas are £65ish, but there are smaller clubs that are much cheaper.

I was going to say the same thing. A lot of holiday clubs don't really advertise or have a flashy website but do exist

The comparison is mostly for the FT nurseyr fees BEFORE funding I've found.

We were paying £250 a week (after tax free childcare) for a FT nursery place. Ds turned 3 and the school nursery offered him a 30 hour funded placed - we went from £250 a week to only childminder pick up fees (£9 a day = £45 a week) so an immediate saving of Over £200 a week. I have arranged starting later with my employer so I do drop off every morning.

but, we have also completely accepted the fact that other than Xmas and 1 family holiday we don't take any other time off together in the year, that's kind of a part of it.

Well, everyone has different priorities and different childcare availability locally.

I think if you're going to use wraparound/holiday clubs, it isn't any more hassle to use them 5 days a week than 3 or 4 really and our school's wraparound is excellent and just as reliable as nursery was.

We don't use it 5 days a week because we do find it helpful to be part time to facilitate things like swimming lessons after school etc but we don't see wraparound as a big thing to be avoided or minimised.

Some people prioritise time with their children when they are little, some when they're older, I think there are arguments in favour of both from a child development angle and also it depends on you and what ages you enjoy most with your children.

I don't think things get easier when they get to school age, at least not until they are a bit older and you have a lot of flexibility with work. While nursery cost us more in terms of actual money spent (funding only came in at the end for us when ours were that age), it was one site all day 9-5 even in school holidays. Breakfast and after school club is mish mash and unreliable around here, some days they are open, some days not.

Holiday club, there is only 1 within about 50 minutes drive and the race to book a slot when bookings open is intense. I literally set my alarm and do it at exactly the moment the booking go live several months in advance. Even then they only do 3 days a week, though it's 8:30-430 which makes for a longer day. The difference is it's £20 a day, snacks and activities included, you send a packed lunch. It's very good value for money.

We make it work because we can work flexibly. Dh is self-employed, so he just takes the dc with him to work or they watch tv while he has an admin day. I have paid leave at Christmas and Easter because I work in high ed, plus my 28 days of AL. Between us we easily cover the school holidays with 2-3 days a week of holiday club in the summer only. With some AL left over for a holiday. If we didn't have so much flexibility, there would be more expense.

In my experience though, 80% of the other school mums either work quite part time and do all the before/after school care and holidays, or people have a lot of family help (grandparents doing the bulk) or they are SAHP. There are very few women like me in professional careers at our school (I think this is why there isn't much wraparound/holiday club care around here, because there is low demand frankly).

It's because you have other younger DC. I think it's when the youngest child starts school you are better off. Plus as others have said your nursery fees were very reasonable compared to many others hence less money saved when they leave nursery.

Yh. As others have said if your almost entirely covered for childcare as it is school will be a massive blow (as my own mother discovered in the 90's) so I don't know why your suprised to be honest ?

But in general if your paying (massively) out of pocket then yes the school years will help lower it.