FREE CHILDCARE FUNDING TAKEN AWAY FROM ME AS I WORK IN EDUCATION

[devonmumxo]

Hello everyone
Hoping someone will be able to shed some light for me. I have a 1 year old in nursery, from September she is now entitled to the 30 free hours. She started in April on the 15 free hours and I also went back to work in April on a 12 hour a week contract and that was that, no problems and they approved my eligibility and it has been fine. So the criteria for the free funding is minimum 16 hours a week and minimum £195 and some pence which I meet as my contract has now gone up to 17 hours and I earn over the minimum amount required. I have since done my re-confirmation for the free childcare eligibility and now they are saying because I work in a school and have the holidays off, I have to do a minimum of 22 hours rather than the national average of 16 hours.

Is there anyone else in this situation or know of anyone in this situation? Yes I have the holidays off but I don’t put her in to nursery in the holidays.

It will depend on your actual employment contract - are you paid pro rata across 12 months or just for the hours worked in term time? If it's the former then that is your issue.

Omg! I’m sorry if that’s correct.
The government pretends to give with one hand whilst most definitely taking with the other!!

You need to do 16 hours a week, 52 weeks of the year so if you have a term time only contract you need to work more hours during that period to make up the hours

Can you do more hours at work this meet the criteria?

Is that because when you average your earnings over the next 3 months you earn less than the minimum because you don't get paid for all of the holidays?

You have to earn the £196 on average through the year, so if you have periods where you get paid less, or not paid at all, it can affect your eligibility.

As said, you’ll need to work out your average across the year taking into account the weeks you aren’t paid for. It’s not because you work in education, it’s because you have a term time contract and therefore don’t earn above the threshold 52 weeks a year. It might not be much to get up to the £196, maybe a few hours working in wraparound or similar would do it?

Your thread title is inflammatory and shows your lack of understanding of the system.

It’s not because you work in education, it’s because you work term time only so your average hours worked is under the required amount.

It's not because you work on education, it's because you don't work the hours that make you eligible.

It has nothing to do with what you do for a living nor the sector you work in. It has everything to do with not earning the minimum amount required. You’re not getting punished, you essentially work part time, term time only 🤷🏼‍♀️

Nothing has been “taken away” from you. You don’t earn enough / work enough hours to qualify for 30 funded nursery hours. You can’t expect the government to pay for 30 hours of childcare when you only work 17 hours a week term time only!

As others have said the 16 hours per week is across the year so they are correct in that it’s 22 hours needed.
Funded childcare is term time only anyway.

Literally this. I respect the initial hustle but it’s unreasonable to be annoyed you’re not getting additional free childcare when you are working less than part time.

Guys you all need to calm down 😂😂😂😂 I’ve never said I’m annoyed I’ve merely asked for advice or if anyone is in the same situation. Obviously I don’t understand it that’s why I’ve asked. Get off your high horses and think what some of your responses does to a stressed, confused mum of 1 child. I’ve never done this before.

Not sure why I’d need to calm down, my response is completely reasonable. I obviously thought you were put out/annoyed because you said they’d been ‘TAKEN AWAY FROM ME BECAUSE I WORK IN EDUCATION’. No one gets the hours over school holidays though, they’re term time only. Some nurseries spread them across the year at 22 hours per week.

I'm going to hope you don't teach Maths at all.

You aren’t meeting the threshold, simple as.

This absolutely. There are criteria and currently OP doesn’t meet them.

I don't understand it. I work as a part time teacher but my salary is above the threshold and spread over 12 months so I get the 30free hours. But the average number of hours I actually work over the year is probably less than 16 a week. How do they know how many hours you do?

It’s not specifically the hours it’s the income per week which they can check via PAYE. It’s a minimum of the equivalent of 16 hours at minimum wage.

Have you spoken to them? I did less that 16 hours but over the minimum amount and they said its fine they won't ask for my contract just check with hmrc.

It's the income threshold that's the issue for the OP.

She has to earn the equivalent of NMW for 16 hours a week, every week. To account for her unpaid periods she has to work 22 hours a week for her income to meet the threshold.

Ok I get that now. Just seems a bit unfair. So someone could just work one day a week but on a high salary, then their pay still brings them over the threshold and they get 30 hours childcare funded. But a low earner like OP loses funding?

if you can’t increase your work hours, can you also do babysitting or tutoring for a few hours a week?

You only work 38 weeks per year. You simply don't work enough to qualify for the funding. You need to earn £196 per week every week.