wwyd?

[JamaicanMeCrazy]

Dd2 goes to a childminder 4 days per week, we love cm and are very happy with the set-up, BUT-

When we started with the cm we were both working full time and could afford the fees comfortably.

Dp is currently out of work for medical reasons, so right now we do not technically need childcare as he is at home, but he is due to have an operation which will leave him unable to care for a toddler for an unknown amount of time.

At the moment we are paying for the cm out of my pay, but it amounts to around 70% of my salary, and the other 30% is mostly taken up with rent, leaving us with around £50-70.

Other money we have coming in is child benefit and my pip which in total is around £500 pm. This money is used to feed us and pay bills, but it is a struggle.

Obviously the easiest way around this is to take dd out of childcare, but then what happens once dp has his op? We will have nobody to look after her and so I would have to give up work which I don't want to do, I love my job!

We don't currently claim anything but cb and pip, so no tax credits or hb but I know we are within the entitlement criteria.

Wwyd? We can't carry on as we are, it's crippling me working so much just to pay bills

TIA

anyone?

Op I am about go into a similar situation where DP will only be working on a supply basis. We are looking at reducing hours with our cm so that ds will go for some of the day & dd just for after school. Would that maybe work for you? Then you wouldn't completely lose your dc's place and could possibly increase as you needed to if cm still has places?

I could ask her, I suppose. We will definitely need the full time place, I have exmil for the remaining days of the week if I need her. I can work up to 17 days in a row so will definitely need the childcare once dp has his op. I'm wondering if I should make a claim for tcs/hb to top up what I earn. I did an online calculator check what we would get and it seems on my income we would be entitled to a massive amount.

Once dp has recovered he will also return to work so at that point it will be essential to have the cm full time.

I don't really want to reduce hours unless there is no way around it as a good cm that can also do pick ups/drop offs in my area is like gold dust and I have a feeling the space would be filled pretty quickly if we did.

I've looked into childcare vouchers too but I find them a but confusing!

Wrt work I can enroll in the family friendly scheme, but that would mean changing my role as I would no longer be able to do the hours I do now within the limits of the ff hours. I don't really want to do this as the role I have is essentially contributing towards my degree and changing it would have a massive impact on my working life and my own happiness too.

I know that isn't relative as such to my childcare but basically to do the job I'm in it would be difficult to change my own hours to be able to do some childcare myself eg condensing my hours into longer days with more days off.

Childcare vouchers are basically money taken from your pay before you are taxed so you don't pay tax on a Max of 243 per month.

Apply for benefits. You are exactly why we have them.

I don't understand why you aren't claiming the tax credits and housing benefit that you're entitled to.

You need to do this for the short term to allow you to keep working. If DP is able to work in the future then you may not qualify and would stop claiming.

Why haven't you been claiming for things you are entitled to?

If you are totally sure you can't get vouchers without changing your role, forget about that and take the long view with that one.

I would definitely speak to your CM - you never know what is going on in anyone else's life - she might be glad of an extra few hours to herself or one less child or whatever for a little bit. On the other hand she might not be able to do it, but if you don't ask, you wont know.

You can not use Childcare Vouchers and Tax Credits for Childcare. You have to use one or the other.

I'm not entitled to tcs for childcare though, so that isn't relevant. You can only get wtcs with childcare element if both of you are working over 16 hrs.

I haven't been claiming as dp only stopped working a couple months ago and before we didn't claim as we didn't need to (though I think we still qualified for a smaller amount, just didn't need the extra money to get by) so we were going to see how it panned out as we didn't know he would be off for so long. Now he is getting an op he will be off longer so I need to figure out what to do as it's now a more long term issue. It would have been sustainable short term.

Speak to your CM. It's really important she is kept in the loop, it may be that she can offer you something to help reduce costs.

Then if you are entitled to benefits to help with bills and housing, please apply for them.

I'm thinking the vouchers won't really make much difference, they would only cover about 1/3 of the fees and I don't pay much tax anyway, I don't earn that much. I don't think I'd really save anything