CMs - How did you set up your fees?

[BlueberryPancake]

I have spoken to a few parents and other childminders and the fees vary quite a bit where we live (a middle-class city-workers part of London). I am not sure how to set up my fees as I am starting up.

One local CM I know charges £50 a day, she has a small ish house and small ish garden. Another CM I know charges £65 a day and £8 an hour and I think that's just too much. Would you go for middle of the road? Did you charge less when you started up and raised the fees year on year? I have also called a couple of nurseries and they vary from £45 a day to £55 a day, depending on age etc.

Many thanks for your help!

I looked at the average in my area and was surprised by how low(ish) they were, 3.50 per hour. I have a friend who also happens to be an Ofsted EYFS inspector (which comes in extremely handy) and she suggested to charge between 4.00-4.50 per hour. So I went for 4.00 per hour. I decided on that as I plan to have a slight increase every April, 10p an hour.

HTH

We have several minders in our village, when I started minding I asked them how much they charged and went for the middle option, £4 ph, I belive with the exception of one or two, we all the charge the same now.

When I set up as a cm in West London 6 years ago, I was charging £4 an hour plus £5 per day for food, nappies etc. After long negotiations with my first mindees parents, I increased my hourly rate to £5 per hour or £45 per day for all new mindee.

I have been researching current hourly rates in the same area and it seems to vary between £6 and £8 per hour.

In my part of London (not so well off part) I have found that parents are not willing to pay a childminder more than the nursery charges. They all seem to expect the charges to be less. The local nurseries charge about £37 per day so I set my rates to £4 hour or £36 for a full 10 hour day. There are some childminders in my area who charge less and perhaps one or two who charge slightly more. I raise my charges as and when the local nursery does.