Nursery asking for extra fees for 15 hours funded

[Teacup40]

Good morning everyone, I wonder if anyone can help me?
My son is entitled to 15 hours funded care and is due to start in September. We have had a fair few visits and all fine until yesterday on his last visit before starting in September they told me that there is a £100 registration fee for tapestry and uniform etc I asked if this is compulsory as I'm not too bothered about uniform and I noticed other children without uniforms she advised me it was, is this correct? I don't want to come across as entitled I'm so grateful for the 15 hours he gets but I just know I'm struggling already and will not have the £100 fee so if this is right I'll not be able to send him.

Apologies if I've posted in the wrong place!

my understanding was from April this year nurseries couldn’t charge this for funded places. The extra for food too should be optional as you can supply your kids lunch instead.

Additional fees for accessing free hours have to be optional, but they don’t have to provide the thing they’re charging for.

Ive had two DDs in nursery and was never charged a registration fee for tapestry so that sounds like bollocks. However they are allowed to say “we charge for putting pictures on tapestry. If you don’t pay, that’s fine you can still have your free hours, but you won’t have tapestry access”

Is it a preschool attached to a school? That's probably why they have uniforms.

If there are other children not in uniform I'd query it.

It might be that the deposit is required to secure the place, and it will be refunded when your child leaves. That's what my children's nurseries do (but they are private nurseries not attached to a school).

Thank you, it sounded like it wasn't optional and I've used tapestry before for free although it was 4 years ago I thought maybe it had changed. It's the way they did it that's put me off because they didn't tell me this at the start, they let me take him and get used to going and then told me at the last minute it seems a bit underhand.

Its a private pre school, so not attached to a school.

That doesn’t matter, they have to follow the same rules for funded places. What is tapestry?

If their policy is the children wear uniforms yes you’ll have to get one. Perhaps it’s a new policy and that’s why there are some that don’t? I would ask them about it. It’s poor form they didn’t outline all of this to you clearly when you expressed an interest though. Charging top up fees for funded hours is common place in most nurseries although the amount varies dramatically. They are perfectly entitled to do this (and need to as the government does not provide sufficient funding) but they should provide you with a breakdown as how rhis money is being used. Again this should have been explained to you at the beginning.

Registration fees are completely normal for private nurseries OP.

It covers the administration of onboarding a new pupil usually - plus in your case the cost of tapestry (which they use for tracking and sharing info on development) and some uniform.

I had to pay a £2,000 deposit and a £150 registration fee for each of my children. All very normal round here.

I don’t think this sounds like any kind of top up fee for the hours - it’s a registration fee, much like you’d have if you joined a gym or something.

It may well be ‘normal’ but it’s illegal to insist that op pays.

I've used private nurseries before and I've never been charged anything extra for registration none of them required uniform so no charge for that but again it was a few years ago so it could just have all changed. I do understand they are underfunded and I get that they need to make it work for them but parents are struggling too and for me £100 just isn't doable

@Teacup40 This article may be of interest:https://www.theguardian.com/money/2025/jul/12/father-refund-nursery-in-england-fees-investigation

I don’t think it is - it’s not a top up fee.

If a nursery has a registration fee for new pupils, why would those claiming free hours be excluded from it, but not those paying? The fee isn’t to fund the hours used - it’s a set up fee.

Stop the nurseries being able to operate as private businesses, and they’ll just stop accepting people wanting 15 free hours. I don’t think that’s in anyone’s interests really.

Was that for a nursery attached to a private school?

No it's not legal. The DofE have made it perfectly clear that it is not acceptable to make accessing early years funding anything other than free at the point of delivery. You don't have to send a child in uniform and any charges must be voluntary. I'd make a complaint to your LA if you can afford to loose the place. Not sure I'd be sending my child in if I complained about somewhere.

No, private day nursery.

I think the nurseries attached to the private schools do similar however.

The registration fee non-refundable, the deposit returned when you leave.

But a gym is a business so they add on fees where they can to make money.

Registration isn’t an optional extra. They have to keep data on the children. It doesn’t cost £100 to fill out the database, they are doing to raise some revenue. I know why they are doing so, because it’s well reported that the funding to too low to cover the costs but they cannot legally insist OP pays for what is a normal administration for the business.

It is also necessary for the nursery to keep a progress record of the children. They can do it in a book. It’s very cheap and effective. Or they can use an app which is pointless and expensive. OP is not obliged to pay for an app. Tell them you don’t need tapestry they can tell you at pickup of any pertinent news and fill out a book with the rest which has worked for 10s of years.

Have you signed a contract OP?

If your child was is over nine months old, is he entitled to 30hrs, not 15?

Do you think a nursery isn’t a business?

The nursery isn’t obliged to take OP on as a customer if she doesn’t follow their terms and conditions.

The free hours cover the cost of the hours the child is at nursery - it does not cover, as the nursery have highlighted, the cost of administration / technology / uniform.

They need to cover their costs, and yes make a profit, to make the business viable. A one off £100 fee for otherwise free childcare is really not a huge sum - and, it’s not attached to the hours eg an extra £10 a day for X, it’s a registration fee.

I think the idea a school needs to just accept a pupil isn’t going to wear the uniform, isn’t going to be using the usual platform for monitoring progress etc because the parent doesn’t fancy paying for it, doesn’t really pass the sniff test. Would you advocate a parent with a child at a primary school just refuse to buy uniform? No.

This. Don’t let them pressure you.

Thank you for all your replies, it's much appreciated.Ive just realised I did fill in the registration form with the manager and she didn't ask for any fee or tell me there was one at the time. It was another member of staff that told me about the fee and she said it was for tapestry registration and uniform.

If they reject the op because she doesn’t want to pay the optional fee that they have disingenuously presented as compulsory, then the LA should be informed because the nursery are breaking the rules.

The hours may be free to the parent but they are paid for by the local authority/government. Its guaranteed income for the nursery and I bet they would be complaining if they lost out on all that funding money.

The nursery are only breaking the rules if they are exclusively charging it to parents claiming free hours.

It is in all likelihood a standard registration fee charged to all parents however (the vast majority of nurseries have these, and £100 sounds about average) - which is fine.

Otherwise about 90% of nurseries in Britain would be breaking the law - as nearly all charge registration fees, and nearly all children are able to claim some free hours now.

Nurseries locally to me are already not claiming ‘that free money’ because they can’t make it financially vianle
to do so.

I understand where your coming from but I'd just like to point out its not that I just don't fancy paying it I don't have the £100 they are asking for.