how to negotiate with my childminder

[bizibee]

My lovely childminder, who my girls love to pieces, will be looking after my oldest who starts full time school tomorrow for 4 hours a day and the youngest for a full day (10 hours). She has told me that she charges for a full day for the oldest one even though she will be in school for 6 hours. The other local childminders appear to charge either just the hours or a "school drop off and pick up" fee. I feel that as DD will be 5 my childminder will not be restricted and could take another under 5 if she wanted. I want to negotiate this but being a wimp and not wanting to loose her I haven't started yet. Does anyone have any good ideas about how to do this?????

If your childminder can take on other charges than I don't see why she is charging you a full fee.

You need to be clear with your request and hope that she doesn't have a waiting list, as you may lose out if you don't want to pay the fees.

noooooooooo she can't charge for the time a child is at school !!!!!

If your child is attending full time education she is no longer counted in the minders early years ratio, theoretically opening up a space for another preschooler.

However, your Childminder may be restricted in advertising a full time vacancy by availability of car seats on school runs, or already have 3 other children that fill the 5 - 7's. But that is not your problem. She's self employed and has to expect her income to go up AND down.

It is absurd that she wants to charge you for a place that she can't legally provide. If you were to use the 6 school hours she wants you to pay for, then (from age 5) you would be breaking the law by not having your child in school.

As a childminder I am very surprised by this. It is not normal practise to charge whilst a child is in FT school. Your child technically counts in the CM's early years numbers (previously known as 'under 5's) until the 31st Aug following their 5th bday BUT ofsted will grant a variation to enable your cm to care for 3 other early years chn at the same time. I would be challenging her charging policy as it is not reasonable

childrenatheart The EYFS statutory guidance clearly states that children aged 4 & 5 who only attend before and after school do not count in the early years numbers, so no variation is necessary.

But I do agree with your point that the OP should challenge the fee on the grounds that it is unreasonable.

Ofsted have recently issued revised guidance stating that a variation IS required in this situation but only needs to be applied for the first time you intend to care for a child in the EY age group attending FT school.

Just found the info:
Ofsted have just released a document about Childminder numbers which has been updated to include information about children in the early years age group attending full time school. Previously Ofsted clarified that it was ok to count such children as over 5's (ie not in the Early Years age groups on your certificate) so if your certificate said you could have 3 under 5's you could also have a 4yo in full time school at the same time. The new guidance still says you can do this BUT you MUST request a variation for it
OFSTED QUOTE
''Caring for children aged four and five in full-time education

If you care for children aged four and five who are in full-time education, either before or after school or in the school holidays, you may count them as older than the early years age group. This allows you to have extra children in the early years age group but no more than six children in total.

You should write and ask us for a special condition on your certificate before the first time you do this. The condition allows you to increase the numbers of children in the early years age group by the number of children aged four and five in full-time education.

Once you have this condition of registration you do not have to tell us about each time this happens.

If it is your own child, a foster child or relative's child who is in full-time education then you do not have to have this condition. Instead you need to ask us to increase the number of children you may have in the early years age group. This is because other children you are responsible for, such as your own children, are not included in the number of children on your certificate. However, we do reduce the number you can care for as a childminder by the number of your own children or any other children you are responsible for such as foster children or grandchildren.

We have a form for you to complete to make sure you give us the right information. It is available at: www.ofsted.gov.uk/Ofsted-home/Forms-and-guidance/Browse-all-by/Other/General/Application-to-vary-or-remove-conditions-of-registration/

The full guidance is available to download from the Ofsted website - link below
www.ofsted.gov.uk/Ofsted-home/Forms-and-guidance/Browse-all-by/Other/General/Factsheet-childcare-The-numbers-and-ages-of-children-that-childminders-may-care-for

childrenatheart sorry to pester but I hate to think that my knowledge base is incorrect so I've just hit the ofsted website to look for this document and cannot find any evidence to support this. Can you point me in the right direction?
I would of expected that 1) any changes to the guidance would result in an addendum that should be posted out to all existing recipients of the EYFS pack. 2) given that the document is statutory no amendments can be made without going through correct parliamentary procedure and 3) as the EYFS review is currently underway, ofsted have no legal jurisdiction to impose any changes.

Sorry, cross post. Will check that out. But I think I'm going to ask the NCMA to challenge it as the statutory wording is quite specific!

childrenatheart Thankyou for making me aware of this ofsted farce document. I've just read the whole thing at its outragous! I'm definatly going to challenge it.

bizibee i'm sorry for hogging your thread. I hope you and your childminder are able to resolve the issue.

I wouldn't charge a whole day, but it might be like someone else said, that she cannot fill the space, because your DD is using the space in her car. It is not illegal and she can negotiate her own contract terms, but it is certainly worth you challenging this. As far as my contracts go, she is in a different age band and can come part time in term and full time in hols, without affecting my numbers. (if you manage this, you may want to see if you can spread the costs over the year, so you don't get a huge bill in the summer)

I have had to turn down an after schoolie this term, as I also pick up twins from a nursery school at 4pm, and due to other after schoolie commitments cannot fit him into my car. I do not charge a full day for before/after school care.

Although if a parent was desperate for a space but it meant me turning down an under 5 then I may possibly ask them to pay for that space (poss 50%) and would explain why.

Pink Canary, I also had to apply for a variation for children "rising 5's " (old language) its on my certificate.

That's ridiculous. If she is unwilling to negotiate, I wouldn't pay the fees, I'd just quickly find another cm (there are plenty who are amazing and she is not the only one).

I had to have the 'rising 5' clause/variation statement on my certificate for my own son! I am requesting that I keep it on there as I now have mindees in that situation.
A 'rising 5' did you know you can float the child between age groups so that you don't go over your numbers.

Anyway back the OP.
The ONLY time I would charge whilst a child is at school is if the parent wanted me to be first point of contact/emergency pick up - basically being on standby - as I would be available to collect my own child iyswim.
Even then i would not charge normal rate - it would be a nominal fee per day.

I would go back to your minder and say you are not prepared to pay this, you have done your research and it appears that it is not common practice. Ask her her reasons why she feels she must charge it. If she starts quoting ratios etc then she is probably mistaken and she needs to check her ratios with Ofsted for clarification (as explained already on here - once a child is full time education, even if they are 4yr old, for the purposes of ratio they can be considered in the older age bracket).
If its for any other reason, then only you can decided if you want to stay on with her if she won't budge.

The only time I have charged for the hours when a child was at school in full-day eduaction was when (like pippin26), I was the emergency contact. The Mum and Dad both worked in London which is 30+ miles from home so the school were emphatic that they had a "local" contact.

Otherwise, it is very unusual for a charge to me made and maybe as others have said, she is under a misaprehension about her numbers.

Just to tag on the document ChildrenAtHeart mentioned so it can be found easily in future -
Ofsted Factsheet: The numbers and ages of children that childminders may care for (26-Mar-2010)