How can I pay for childcare?

[Mrszz]

Hi
We have a 3 year old who is entitled to 30 hours free childcare and a 1 year old who is starting nursery. My 3 year old is in nursery an hour a day over the free hours therefore the nursery have said he is classed as full year so he cannot do term time only so I will be paying for both my children to be in nursery every day I am working during the holidays and my wages just don’t cover it. I have spoken to the nursery who have said they will do a year forecast and spread the cost of the holidays over the year which then means every month I am left with zero from my wage, not 1p to spare. My husbands wage doesn’t cover all the household bills and some how we need to find £400 extra a month to keep us a float, we have cut back completely and have no luxuries at all. I have no idea what we are going to do, we are not entitled to any tax credits etc and have no family who will help us with the childcare. My husband works away sometimes and if he isn’t working away he could still be any where in the country so the time he comes home can vary, so evening work is out of the question and he also is called in a lot of the weekends so again I can’t do this. I can’t eat or sleep just worrying about money constantly, how are people juggling work and childcare fees? I am earning just above minimum wage and work part time, I also forgot to mention my 3 year old doesn’t start school until next year. I feel like I’m sinking and would love to hear how other people are managing.

Thank you

Have you looked into childcare vouchers or tax free childcare to help with the costs?
Is there another nursery or childminder option that might work out cheaper?

Could you pick up extra work through an agency just for the times you know your husband will be home for the odd evening or weekend. A lot of care agencies work like this using bank staff when needed. It may not be your cup of tea but it may get you a few hours extra work when it suits you and your family.
Are there any opportunities to retrain or alter your work hours?

I don't know if they're obliged to do so but certainly when mine were little the free hours were taken off the bill which was then divided by twelve. The nursery's policy seems punitive.

Can you condense your working hours to save nursery fees? Or just reduce your hours if it's putting you into deficit?

We also had a 2 year age gap and only 15 free hours at the time. When dc were 1 and 3 we struggled a lot and got into debt until dd1 started school. It's a very expensive time.

Thank you so much for your helpful comments. I unfortunately wouldn’t be able to adjust my hours at work, my manager hates me being part time and think he would quite happily have me leave so he could employ someone full time (my hours were reduced after my first child by a different manager at the time).

Childminders are few and far between here and the pre school only offers 9-12 but it was something I had considered.

I will definitely look into the agency, I didn’t think of that. It’s not ideal as I do love the career I am in but right now I just need to cover the bills.

I knew things would be tight but I just assumed my eldest could do term time, it seems our local nurseries aren’t very accommodating. If I didn’t have to pay for my eldest to attend during the holidays I think we could manage comfortably without this constant headache.

Thank you again

If you're working part-time how is 30 hours not sufficient?

If you need an extra £400 per month you could borrow £5000 to tide you over for a year until your 3yo starts school. Either quit your job and stay home for a year, or work for nothing for a year in order to keep your job. Then at the end of the year your childcare costs will drop and your job will become profitable again, allowing you to pay back the debt.

I forgot to mention the nursery have said if I am just using the free hours I would need to put my eldest in 9-3 mon-fri but I work full days mon, tues & weds which they allow me to use all the free hours for as I’m paying an extra hour a day. All so confusing and awkward, they do also hold back an hour day and ‘bank it’ hence why I need to pay extra.

Find another nursery! They all do free hours slightly differently - one attached to our local school lets you do full days, others don't.

What does the Banked hour mean? I get saving an hour a day if you were to use 29 due to their inability to provide 30 but not the you must pay 31 only want 30 but we wont give you the 1 we insist you pay for. I would check that with you LA.

Look at alternatives child-minders have changes all the time so ones you rang last week may now have a space coming up, did you ask if they would notify you if a space became available?

Full days Mon, Tues and Wed surely isn't over 30 hours though? Imo the best solution is to find a different nursery.

Thank you everyone, we are going to look into different nursery’s that they both can go to, I have left my details with a few childminders too. By the sounds of things the current nursery are just doing as they please which has made me loose faith in them, it was just ideal as it is around the corner from our house and also 5 minutes away from my children’s future school.