30 hrs free childcare not actually free?

[Blossomkitty40]

Hello. Just applied for the 30 hrs funding for my daughter so she can go to preschool full-time. I work part-time at the moment. What's stressed me out is when I was in the middle of applying for it a message popped up saying something along the lines of "Tax credits pays for 70% of childcare so your payments will go down". I'm not too bothered about them going down, or even stopping as I will be able to work more once my daughter is full time. What's bothering me is that I don't get an awful lot of tax credits anyway as I'm currently paying back an overpayment. But if they are saying that tax credits is paying 70% of this "free childcare" does that mean that I could potentially end up owing tax credits money next year because I've claimed the "30 hrs free childcare" Has anybody got any experience with this? TIA.

I don't completely understand what you mean but tax credits doesn't pay for 30 hours.

What they mean is that if you currently claim the childcare element of tax credits, then you will no longer be entitled to this (because your bill will be lower).

Ok, that's maybe what it meant. It just said my payment would go down because tax credits pays for 70% of the funding. But as I don't claim for childcare of them hopefully it won't be affected, or affected to the point that I end up owing them money. Thanks for your reply.

Also bear in mind that it isn't 30 free hours, it is 30 funded hours. The rate the govt funds doesn't cover the nurseries' costs so they will charge extra for drinks, snacks, consumables like tissues etc.

You'll probably still have a monthly nursery bill which could be quite significant.

Funding is paid by your Local Authority direct to your child's provider, nothing to do with Tax Credits which is an income based benefit.

@MintJulia yeah, they have said about the extra fee to cover the lunch period. I'm ok with that, I think. Thanks.

I'm not sure what it was referring to then, it definitely said my payment was going to go down once I claimed for the 30 hrs.

Think of it as if you currently pay £100 and your bill after the 30 hours is £60 then tax credits childcare element will only pay 70% of the £60.

It way be worth checking if you’re better off on UC as that covers up to 85% of childcare