Help please - childcare hours

[tori1301]

Help please! I am currently on maternity leave and I'm due to return to work beginning of September. My baby turns 9 months in September. I am confused with the free childcare hours. I know it states that if my baby turns 9 months in September then technically he won't get his childcare hours until January term. However, it states on the gov website that if I am due to return to work between 1st May and 30th September, I need to apply by 31 August and I can get the hours from 1 September as I will be returning to work then. I have received the childcare code however the childminder has said that I can't use the hours until January. Obviously this doesn't help me at all as a single mother and I cannot afford to pay for a full month. I have tried to call Childcare choices but noone seems to know the answer. I have even challenged it with HMRC as I don't understand why it says my return to work will affect when I can get the hours. Would this be correct that I won't be able to use the hours until January term despite me returning to work in September?

Deleted as don’t think I understood your post correctly, sorry!

Yes both things have to be true. Your child must be 9 months before the start of term (31/8) and back at work with one month of term starting (30/9).

If your child is not 9 months until September then you dont meet that criteria so will need to wait until January.

You did and you were right!

I worked in preschool a couple of years ago and 2&3 year old funding was the term after the birthday so I'd assume the same applies and it'll be January. Which is crap when it's supposed to support returning to work as some children will be over a year old when they get it.

If you are a single parent, check to see if you can get help from universal credit, that is a different scheme

I have even challenged it with HMRC as I don't understand why it says my return to work will affect when I can get the hours.

It's because your child has to be 9 months and you have to be working.

It's both criteria, not just one or the other.

We fell foul of this, my baby was due in November, but was late and born in December. The 30th November was the cut off for funding from September, so we had to wait until Jan due to his tardiness! Even though I was back at work in August.

I just think it can be very misleading to alot of parents to be honest and as someone has said above it's crap because it is meant to provide support for working parents but is dependent on when your child was born. It is what it is I suppose!

It is, and we didn't totally understand it either! The stupid thing was that I applied on the government website and it gave me a code - so obviously we thought could use it. Wasn't until the council rejected and had to redo our invoices the problem came up.

Yeah this. It’s not either or, it does have to be both.

It's crap for people like yourself who are just about the cut off, but it's literally the first year it's been applicable to 9 month olds so at least when you get it from Jan it's considerably earlier than you'd have got it if your baby had been born last year or the year before. So it'll still be a big help overall.

Depending on income levels you could look at UC childcare or tax free childcare for those months

I’m a bit confused, the cut off for autumn term has always been 31st August since funding started. It made sense that the funding for younger ages would be the same. Whether your lo has a birthday in November or December they still would have had to wait for the spring term that starts in January.

For birthdays yes, but for babies turning 9 months, it's the difference between August and September.

Ahhh, that does make sense. My brain clearly doesn’t work like that 🤣🤣🤣. It’s been a long day 🤦‍♀️