Getting full 15 hours free?

[Sorchak]

My son goes to nursery for 3 days a week. He will be entitled to the 15 hours free childcare from next month as he turns 3. The nursery spreads the cost of these free hours over the whole year to equate it to 15 hours per week for 38 weeks. As a result their stated free hours are allocated from 1 -3:20 pm every day.
But as my son only goes three days a week, this means he won't get his full 15 hours. Is this right? Everywhere I've looked it just says they are entitled to 15 hours but is this the case even if they only go part time to child care ie. 3 days a week instead of 5.
Thank you for your help... its very confusing and difficult to get the full information.

Could it be because they're spreading it over the year?

Some nurseries just do the 15 hours a week for 38 weeks which is 570 hours a year.

If they are spreading that over 52 weeks then it is 10.9 hours a week so 3 days sounds about right.

Yes nurseries can allocate slots off free time, as yours have.
The funding doesn't match the cost of delivery, so they can't have people using 2 days of 7.5 hours term time only, as they'd be losing a huge amount of money.

No that’s not correct. You’re losing out on around 1/3 of the hours over the year.

the nursery can’t claim for hours you’re not using. I’d email and remind them they’re not allowed to do that. They can just claim for the hours you’re using and you can use the other hours elsewhere.

They are allowed to offer the free house in sessions. for example 9-12 or 1-4. As the funding is for education only it is fairly common for providers not to cover lunchtime in free hours

The government funds the hours at a much lower rate than the actual cost - some providers only get £4 or 5 per hour which is why many nurseries are closing

If you want the hours free then you could look into a school-based nursery - but again they only offer 15 hours in term time

Does your son turn 3 this month or in April? To get funding they must be 3 before April 1st.
Settings can choose to offer funding in sessions if it doesn't suit you look around for a setting that does....the 15 hours is term time only.

Thank you for all your answers. I'm more clear on it now...so Nurseries are allowed to allocate the free sessions and so if he misses out on some hours because he doesn't attend that day,that's my bad luck.
But I can use those hours within a different setting if I so wished.
And nurseries need to make money I suppose so it's not financially clever to have all his 15 hours on reduced subsidied rate within three days of attendance.
Thank you all for your input!