To find nurseries charging on bank holidays unfair?

[Revoltingpheasants]

Is it just me who finds the system at most nurseries so unfair and frustrating? DD attends on Mondays and Fridays which means that for the Easter holiday she will only go once at the start of the holiday and once at the end.

It seems so unfair as it would be different if she attended Tuesdays and Thursdays.

I must admit I am a bit lost with the idea nursery would refuse to take her on Mondays and Fridays. I know a lot do a two day minimum which is more understandable but refusal to let her attend on those days would be very odd!

It’s about time someone sued them for breach of contract. You can’t charge for a service that you’re not actually providing and it’s irrelevant what their T&C’s state if it’s not within the law. 🤷🏻‍♀️

Oh there’s no end of days you’re paying for while not using it:

• bank holidays
• inset days
• holidays
• when they have a temperature so you can’t bring them in for 48h

At least with a bank holiday I’m also off work. With the random inset days and illness days (when they aren’t ill) I have to source alternative childcare which is problematic.

Annoying to be paying the nursery £110 a day for an inset day where they aren’t providing any care - then also have to pay someone else another £150 to provide childcare that day.

Unless this wasn’t in the t&c’s that you signed up to then YABU

Inset would be a term time / school based nursery; hers is private so nothing like that. But it is more akin to your child being unable to attend because of a temperature and that bill being passed between other parents.

Nope mine is a private 51 week a year nursery and they do inset days for training.

We’ve never had that but fair enough. It isn’t really 51 weeks if they are closing for INSETs.

All the people saying they still have to pay staff. I have worked in several nurseries in the 30 years since I qualified. Never did I get paid for them. They were part of your statutory holiday allowance.
Now I'm a childminder. I'm closed for bank holidays but no parent pays for them.

This is exactly what I would want.

If my child could actually go to nursery on the Monday then of course I wouldn't mind paying, but if it's closed and I'm still paying, I don't think it's fair.
I got around this by working Tues to Thurs but not everyone can do that (and if everyone did, nurseries would have to change their structure to accommodate that)

But if you work on Mondays, you are getting a paid day off presumably? If it were shared between everyone, people who aren't getting a paid day off would be paying a share too. Suck it up. You should have considered this before booking your days at the nursery!

When you literally have no other realistic choice other than to work Mondays, people laying into you for having the temerity to work Mondays is infuriating.

I mean, I’m a teacher, and I get paid in the holidays so should I just let them bill me then and not send her?

You’ve had some totally absurd replies from people who seem unable to grasp the point you are making about the nurseries charging structure which is patently unfair. You obviously should just ignore these and take comfort from the people who understand your point and sympathise. However if you go on mumsnet you are always going to get a fair few of this type of reply. Good luck OP.

Thanks I am normally a suck it up kind of person but the combination of monday and Friday is galling!

I agree OP, you don't get the service, so why should you pay for those days?

But childcare seems to operate completely differently from the rest of the world.

I had it with the childminder too as my son used to go after school on Mondays and Fridays so it was disproportionately bank holidays. Although if she was off herself eg August bank holiday week, she wouldn't charge for the bank holiday.

I think it's time the CMA looked into it. I agree with you.

This is why my child doesn’t do nursery on Mondays. They still have to pay their staff

All these people acting like they are so very smart for dodging the Monday are being so obtuse.

Not all jobs give you a choice of days. I am a teacher and it’s actually quite unusual that my school do - I know a few schools who are happy to grant part time but they decide on the days you’re working.

If I didn’t work Monday and Fridays I wouldn’t really be able to work. DH is generally away Tuesday morning to Thursday night. He works from home Monday and Friday and so he can take our older child to school and collect him then. Breakfast club only starts at 8 and I wouldn’t be able to get from DS’s school to my school for an 825 start. I’m not some slightly dim person who signed my child up for Mondays and now has realised.

I just see it as a day off op - like you’re off already so what does it matter that your kid isn’t at nursery

the cost is per month not an hourly or day rate 🤷‍♀️ I pay for 4 days and have Tuesday off - it’s annoying but I’m off work bank holidays and I’m not down any money that month I earn the same so It doesn’t make a difference to my income that month

xmas and Easter is annoying as I have to book annual leave to cover it - or rope parents in ! But again I’m not down any money and I just suck it up and pay

if the policy changed then the fees will Just go up regardless - and your bill would likely still just be as much as you pay now

It is a bit illogical. People who work four day weeks and the like get their holidays pro rataed to make things fair. So a person who has Mondays off works the same days in a year as one who takes Wednesdays off. But it doesn't work like that for nursery. I guess the maths would get complicated as people change days around.

It is - they work out their costs, divide by number of days they have (days x children places) and that’s how much they charge. Because your day is nominally a Monday makes no difference.

Some really weird comments on this. If your child goes on a Mon and Fri and your nursery closes for bank holidays but expects payment, then you pay the same fee as everyone else but get less for it. It’s as simple as that. If they aren’t able to offer parity for children who attend on a Monday/Friday then that’s just a poor setup. OP will be several days of childcare down a year v someone who has paid the same fee for a Tuesday/Wednesday. It’s a stupid way to operate but has been weirdly normalised in childcare when no one would accept it anywhere else!

The cost is a daily rate, surely? I mean yes, you do get a bill per month but it wouldn’t stay the same if I added a day.

I agree too. Especially for a private setting when they could open - pay your team time and a half like most (retail / hospitality) sectors and give the parents the option to then either pay normal rate if they don’t send their kid in because they have the time off themselves or pay the time and a half rate for those who would benefit from the childcare - I’m sure most parents who do work would opt in to that arrangement. Childcare sucks in this day and age, even schools need to rethink how they open to meet the changing landscape of parents work patterns changing in society and grandparents now retiring later and later but that’s a rant probably for another thread.

I agree, it’s really frustrating. A bit of sensible budgeting and planning on the nursery’s part would mean that the cost of those days could be factored into everyone’s bill over the course of the year, rather than Monday parents solely footing the bill. It’s common in other industries for these extra costs to be incorporated into the overall picture.

e.g. we all pay the same £ for an item of clothing from the same shop regardless of needing size 8 or size 18
We all pay the same amount for a stamp to post a letter whether it’s going 5miles or 300.
We all pay £9.90 for ‘a prescription’ whether it contains 10 pills or 30.
It should be the same principle of needing nursery on a Monday or a Tuesday.

It’s particularly unfair when people have pay for alternative childcare/plead with family to help etc just because they’re a nurse/prison officer etc and have to work the bank hol.

But you are literally getting paid to not work on the Bank Holiday Monday and Friday, right? So isn't it fair that some of your wage for day off on Easter Monday will pay for the nursery staff who also cannot work on Easter Monday?

Either everyone gets paid for Bank Holidays or no one does (self-employment excepted). In this case, everyone does, so it's perfectly fair.

Those people who work Tuesdays and Thursdays aren't getting a free day off on Easter Monday like you are.