To think the nursery are wildly unreasonable?

[Gerrp]

Our nursery (just outside London, if relevant) had to close for 72 hours due to the storms. They have offered no refund. It’s 120 a day and we have had to source alternative childcare on top of this. I realise this is an unforeseen circumstance in some respects but also, they must have insurance? I’m absolutely fed up of feeling financially stretched all the time and this has just topped it off! I’m assuming we have no rights to argue this?!

Exactly. When I had 2 under the age of 3, I was paying more money for nursery than I was earning per day. I stuck with it for my career, knowing it would get better. If I was charged that for NO nursery, that would have been the final straw. Utterly bonkers that that can be allowed.

Ours was only £80 a day (outside London) but two children so £160 per day total 🙈 I can't believe people think that it's fine just to suck up that loss even if no service is provided. It's a fortune!

That's a very high fee. We lived just outside of London and paid £80 a day which covered 7:30am to 6pm.

It's standard unfortunately. No refunds for snow days either.

I don't think this is fair since no service was provided. I would complain and start looking for a more reliable nursery.

An hour outside London surely means you're closer to at least one entirely different city so not sure why you described it that way.

Yeah I think you should be refunded, but loads of nurseries have these bonkers terms. What is the £120 actually for? Is a portion of it for food/nappies. Surely you should get that part back? £360 for nothing 🙄

Wow I bet your children have an interesting vocabulary!

I guess you'd rather have the money, and spend those 3 days looking for a new nursery? It's rubbish, but nurseries don't often operate with a buffer. So no money for 3 days, will mean no staff are paid, and no bills are paid and there's no money for repairs. Staff will walk, repairs won't happen, the nursery won't re-open. Doesn't mean it's right, doesn't mean you should be ok with it. But that is the choice.

In a world where you want the nursery to close down for good - yes
In a world where you don't - no

I think that some nurseries absolutely are struggling, and others make an absolute fortune.
most nurseries are not charities and owners only own the nurseries to make a profit.

I think my opinion would depend on whether they were a chain or a small independent nurseries.

I don’t understand what it is about child care settings that makes people think they should be able to expect full payment for doing nothing.

Even self employed child minders get away with charging for non working bank holidays to ‘keep the place’ I don’t know any other self employed people who expect to be paid for non working days.

It’s irrelevant to OP that the nursery still has to pay staff. Those staff aren’t looking after OP’s children and, as well as paying the nursery to not look after her child, she is having to pay someone else to do their job.

It may not be the fault of the nursery, but neither it is OP’s fault. They are not providing the service they are being paid to provide, and any losses the business suffers as a result should be built into their business plan.

Weather is defined as an act of god for insurance purposes

nursery staff are so underpaid its criminal. if all parents didnt have to pay for those 3 days what would happen to wages for that month? its pretty standard. if staff took a hit on pay in these circumstances staff retention would be worse than it is now.

Yes exactly, the nursery owner I know drives a very expensive car, wears luxury designer goods, etc, some nurseries don’t make a lot for sure , but the nursery my daughter is at makes very healthy profit as does the family friend.

Many nurseries are already struggling to survive, many are closing. Most are expected to accept the Government funded places and those places are not funded at a high enough rate. So I don't think they can just absorb unexpected costs like this to their business plan.
Presumably parents want high quality childcare and they want nurseries to stay open. So I accept it seems unfair but I understand why nurseries charge.

Well at least it was only 3 days. I had to paid 80% fees for nothing for months during COVID for my daughters nursery 🤷‍♀️ I’m sure you will find that it is specified in the fees policy somewhere

The staff still need paying whether they were at work or not. It's not their fault they couldn't go in.

@LateNightReads seriously?? That’s insane when there was furlough pay?

@GroovyChick87 great, their employer can pay them then! If this happened in my industry we wouldn’t be charging clients for zero work!

That’s tough. If a restaurant doesn’t open you don’t still pay for your meal. It’s part of the risk of having a business.

Ours has had to close lots of times. It never crossed my mind that we would be refunded. It's really frustrating, especially with the price you are paying, but I just don't think refunds in these circumstances are a thing.

It's rubbish but they'll still need to pay their staff and bills so they have to charge on the very rare occasion that they're forced to close. I doubt you'll find a nursery that wouldn't charge in this situation

Yes it's shit and will probably be in the terms and conditions that you have to pay but I don't understand how they've been closed for 3 days? The storm was Friday, Saturday and Sunday surely even if they experienced damage it would only be today they were closed or potentially Friday that's only 2 days?

OP will have signed a contract agreeing to pay if they have to close due to unforseen circumstances.

It's not comparable to a restaurant where there isn't a contract in place.

The damage occurred over the weekend - they probably couldn't get anyone in to fix things right away.