Tax free childcare

[allthingsred]

Hi ive set up my tax free childcare account.

Picked my sons nursery from the list supplied. & im going to put in a little amount to make sure it all works.

Just wondering after you put in a payment, how long does it take to recieve a top up & then transfer over to the nursery?

Im paid at the end of the month (when fees are due)
So i will have to pay in around 700, get the top up & pay out as quickly as possible

Im overly anxious about using this service, if i do anything wrong, i cant afford to lose that amount of money.

Very quickly. About 1-2 days at most

Working days

If it’s too tight dates wise you might need to get a month ahead (easier said than done I know).

We manage to pay in on the 27th and pay nursery by the 1st but we do have a month in hand in the account so if there’s delays it doesn’t matter.

We usually find 24hrs is enough though.

You can’t lose the money though, it’s fine in that sense. As long as you selected the right nursery to pay.

Ahh thank you.
Ive quadrupled checked its the right nursery.
(Tbf there is only 1 with that name in my postcode)

I would love to get ahead, just not possible, this will be my last smp, & been difficult enough surviving on that. Saving money to get ahead is a dream..
(until these 15 hrs kick in, probably a far far off dream at that!)

Im gonna speak with the nursery, its a fairly large one so im.sure there will be others in my postion. (Maybe if i show them a screenshot of it being paid, even if its not hit their account, they will give me a bit of grace)

You can set up automated payment dates so if you pay in on payday and set it to pay out a couple of days later the timings should work. You do know you only get up to a maximum top up of £500 each quarter?

No i didnt...
I think ive worked it out, my top up should be around 150 pm..
How long is a quarter? Is that 3 months?
Does it start from when you open your account?

God..they really dont want people to go back to work do they.. it really doesnt pay.

Yes, £500 top up every 3 months so it sounds like you'll be ok. What is your monthly bill in total?

I paid some in yesterday, cleared and topped up by this morning, paid out to provider now.

Mine shows the top up within hours

It's £500 so that's quite a lot off the bill really. And when the "funded hours" kick in it will be even less.

Yeah it is im just stressed cause,of having to find the inital payment, & it is still like paying my rent twice.(even with the 20% back)

It will be worth it. The way things are at the moment, im lucky to be able to go back to a job i enjoy. Loads dont have that.

& im sure when i have recieved a first proper wage rather than smp, ill feel more positive rather than anxious.

It is a tough time OP. It will be worth it for your career prospects in the future. You are lucky that more help with childcare is on the way soon. Unfortunately I just missed out.