Retainer Fee - can no longer afford it.

[spukalili]

I have two children - one who is 2 and a half and the other who is just 10 weeks old. We've had a rotten old time of it with childcare with my first, with one childminder cancelling our contract last minute, a nursery going inadequate across the board, and then there being nobody available for the days/times we needed. We finally got it sorted and he's very happy, but it made me super anxious about returning to work.

This time round, I wanted to make sure we were prepared in advance, and while I was pregnant, spoke to my existing childminder about whether she might be able to take my baby when I went back to work. She said to wait until the baby had been born (May), then we'd look at a deposit or something similar to secure the spot.

I kept asking as knew I'd be in a better position to pay a deposit or a retainer while on full pay, but was never given an answer. Eventually, around June time, she told me that she needed 50% of her fees from September until I returned to work in April. By this time, I was on maternity pay and money was already tight, but I thought we could manage.

We've had a major change to our outgoings and as a result, we can no longer afford the additional £3000 that we'd need to pay between Sept-April. Thankfully, no contract has been drawn up yet, but I feel very mean suddenly moving the goalposts just because we've had a change. I've tried everything to work out how to cover the costs (I work in finance - budgeting is my speciality!) but we just can't do it.

I suppose I'm just looking for a bit of advice or support on how to tell her - she's a great childminder and she currently looks after DS1 for one day a week (increasing to two days from September) and I really wish we could afford to secure a place for our littlest, but it's a lot of money for us to find when we're already struggling to cover our basic living costs. I feel really horrible and know it's going to be super awkward.

It's a lot of money. I guess all you can do is wait and hope she still has space when it gets nearer the time. Her dates make sense with the school year so I can understand why she told you in June and needed you to pay from September. And it's not her fault that you didn't save enough money to retain her while you were on full pay, she probably wasn't sure what would be available until then. It's obviously much better for her if she has someone for 5 days a week as random days are much harder to fill. You need to tell her asap so she can try to fill her space, she has outgoings and needs to make money too.

How about moving ds to nursery at Easter and the baby fitting in to his spot at the childminders? If he's 3 before April he will get funded hours which can be used at school nursery, day nursery or childminder.

Thank you - I'll definitely tell her today so hopefully she can find someone to fill the spot for September when she returns. I appreciate it's a business for her, and any period without an income is going to impact her.

It's definitely not her fault that we're in our current financial position (not our fault either, but that's not really relevant, I suppose). I didn't find her until fairly far into the pregnancy anyway, so I didn't have many months of full pay to be able to cover the cost. And to be fair, paying weekly wouldn't have been an issue had we not had this change of circumstances - cost of living increase is getting us all unfortunately!

This is such a good idea, and I hadn't even considered it! Thank you so much!

This is what one of my parents has done because we simply can't squeeze both children in. We're expecting to change the children over (horrible expression!) in a few months' time and we'll do the nursery run for them, too.

If you were my parent, I would consider being flexible for you, so it's worth talking to her and explaining your situation. There might be room for negotiation. Lovely parents are as highly valued as good childminders!

Ratios are allowed to be changed especially for Siblings so you could discuss with her if she's willing to increase her ratio in the circumstances with a smaller deposit. Does the cm take funded hours?

Is this the norm? Maybe area dependant? Sounds bizarre to me but understand that could be me being naive, but I'd have thought a months deposit would hold the spot?

But the OP doesn’t need the space til April. She’s asking the CM to have an empty space from September to April to guarantee her child a place. Even charging 50% fees, the CM is out of pocket. A months fees is probably only a few hundred pounds, and it sounds like she’d be losing around £6k.

If you did some of the KIT days, would that help your budget?

Not massively - I only get 10 days and have already used 2 of them. There are 30 weeks of payments until I return to work. I'd feel worse if I committed to paying the fee and then couldn't (not to mention non-payment fees are £5 a day and non-negotiable). Thank you for the suggestion though.

I understand it's fairly common! Some childminders only charge a fee if they've had enquiries from other families for that period but some just charge a flat fee. In fact, one of my childminders said she wouldn't charge a retainer fee, until she found out that my other one would, then decided she would do the same. So I think it is common, and it does make sense, but not many people hold a place for 7 months like we wanted to.

We're essentially paying for the security of knowing we have a space, and helping her partially cover the reduction she'll have in income for holding that space. It's only due to our change in circumstances that we can no longer justify it.

Thank you! I like to think I'm a good parent but I'm not sure how flexible she can afford to be. She's relatively new to the scene (has been operating for a couple of years) and I totally appreciate that it's her business and she needs it to be financially viable. You sound lovely, very understanding (do you have any availability? 😂)

I've sent her an email explaining where we are, that I'd love for my little one to go with her still but understand that there's no guarantee due to us being unable to cover the fee. I'll check back with her early next year to see if she has availability, and if she doesn't then I'll just consider other childcare in the area. I'm annoyed that we can't afford the fee but of all the things we're able to cut, this just happens to be the easiest at the moment.