Another one about Consumables charges

[StevieNic]

Our child attends the primary school nursery two days a week, as its term-time only we’ve kept her in the private nursery two days a week all-year round an we use 22 hours funded childcare for that bill.

The school charge us for lunch and 50p a day for fruit. The nursery charge us for breakfast and lunch and then separately a £7-a-day consumables charge.

We provide nappies, wipes, sun cream and they don’t go on trips so this would only be for stuff like art supplies. There’s no way the activities they do costs that much in materials is there? We are struggling just to afford the food shop and put petrol in the car lately so I find it a bit annoying. Has anyone refused to pay? I fear it would harm our relationship with the nursery.

I'm not sure you CAN refuse to be honest. How much does the school charge you for lunch and how much does the nursery charge you for breakfast and lunch. It's difficult to know whether it's reasonable without being given the actual figures.

The meal charges are £3 at the private nursery and £2:75 at the school, no issue with either of those charges. The school doesn’t add a ‘consumables’ charge at all.

Well £3 for breakfast AND lunch sounds reasonable. Surely they will just ask you to leave if you don't pay all the agreed charges?

Forgot to say,sorry your struggling - it can't be easy (it never used to be this bad). Sorry I can't help more I just don't know what to suggest😢

Reasonable to ask the question as to how they get to the £7? Doesn't need to be accusatory, just interested. It does sound a lot. But ultimately, if within the rules about what they can charge extra for, you'll have signed a contract agreeing to pay.

Do you mean all you have to pay is £7 twice a week? And they’re in childcare all year round ?

(Plus food but obviously you’d need to feed your child anyway)

Sorry you are struggling but you can’t refuse to
pay. You get 22 funded hours already, it’s just a bit of top up. We all have to pay it and more.

It’s probably to cover the gap from government funding. My childminder and preschool charge me a top up, it’s not really for materials.

@fashionqueen0123 no we pay for two full days at the school nursery which isn’t funded. The two days at the private nursery are meant to be funded but we pay food and the consumables charge

You need to work out if the costs were less if you swapped your funded hours to the school nursery and just paid at the private nursery

Ok that makes sense. That’s probably the cheapest way.

The thing is the gov have made it very hard for nurseries to survive. You could refuse to pay the £7. But in all honestly if all parents do that they’ll likely go bust and shut.

The £7 will be covering lots of things but they have to pretend it’s only for nappies etc due to silly government rules. The funded hours are only supposed to cover basic childcare.

OP, scroll down on here to 'Charging'.
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/early-education-and-childcare--2/early-education-and-childcare-effective-from-1-april-2025

This started about 15 years ago when i was Chair of a preschool. I remember we got a letter saying the council had heard some places were doing it and it was being cracked down on. However, now everywhere seems to do it and they don't make it clear that it's voluntary.

This from Google:
UK nurseries in England are not allowed to charge mandatory "top-up" fees to bridge the gap between government funding rates and their own fees for funded hours. While they can charge for consumables (meals, nappies, sun cream), these must be voluntary; parents must have the option to provide their own items or refuse meals to access free hours.

You can certainly say you're struggling to pay the consumables fee and what does it cover as you'd like to provide the items yourself instead. If they say it's mandatory then you can say it's legally supposed to be voluntary and complain to the council - I've no idea what would happen from there though.

The nursery can't have a blanket 'consumables' charge - they need to itemise what it is for.
They also can't charge you for anything that is necessary to deliver the curriculum eg pencils, paper
They can only charge for things like food, nappies and wipes, trips out or extra curricular activities like French or yoga.
Also, all charges must be voluntary and you need to have the option to miss out on the activity or provide your own.

So, depends what you want to do - if you kick up a fuss they can't really charge you, but they would probably argue that the funding doesn't cover the cost of their provision.

The bottom line is if you don’t pay, you’ll be given notice because the maths just does not math

My understanding is that the consumables charges are intended to cover activities, trips, (and nappies etc but you said that you’re paying for these) and are voluntary for funded hours (since last year).
They should have told you that these are voluntary charges and they should provide at least some sort of itemisation. Does your child go on trip or does activities which cost money?
£7 per day is a lot in my opinion, rhe ingredients for baking a cake or doing some hand painting don’t cost £7 per child etc. Unless they use the money towards a sinking fund and one day they’ll take your little one on an amazing trip.

Consumables charges are not meant to subsidise the amount paid by the government.

Ultimately if you can't afford that provision then you need to change to a setting that you can afford, just like anything in life.

Thanks for the advice everyone. We send in nappies, wipes and sun cream, nappy cream etc, they don’t go on any trips of have any classes with instructors. They do messy play and art and sometimes bake as part of the early years curriculum so I expect they will say the fee is for those supplies.

My worry is that if we said we weren’t paying since those things should be provided as part of the ordinary provision they will ask us to leave. We live in a village and there aren’t any other childcare options nearby really.

Well yes that's what will happen, as they need to make enough for the business to be viable.

£7 a day for consumables is ridiculous. Ask for a breakdown via email and state you’re struggling to find the money. In the email explain that you send in (all the things you mentioned you send)

Don’t give in to a phone call. You need proof of what they say because if they do try and stop your child attending you could complain to OFSTED) No one should be being asked to leave a nursery because they can’t afford to pay extras that haven’t been itemised or advised are optional. They are taking the proverbial. There’s absolutely no consumables that would cost this much. You could even say something along the lines of ‘We’re hoping to save money and withdraw our child from some of the more expensive activities.’ (which we know don’t actually exist end that it’s actually to bridge a gap that you didn’t create and isn’t your fault) You could bake a cake for £7 if you went to Aldi and you could do acrylics on a canvas for your living room so you really should be unable to move in your house for things your child has created? Or perhaps the messy play is exceptional? Doubt it.

It's not really an Ofsted issue.

It may be an issue for the local authority though as they supply the funding. The nursery will have signed a provider agreement with the LA that sets out what they're allowed to charge for, so I doubt they can terminate a child's contract due to the parent reasonably asking them to stick to the terms of the agreement.

I would find the provider agreement for your LA and read through it to check what the nursery has agreed to.
And then if you choose to query the consumables fee, do it politely and via email.

That's the only way they can make a profit on the 'free' hours. The government doesn't give enough to properly cover it. Yours sounds quite high but I think all need to add on some costs. No matter where you go you probably can't avoid it.

If you refuse it they'll just withdraw your kid.

It’s not for consumables! It’s the gap they have from government funding and they are only allowed to call it consumables.
ask if any of the nurseries in your area are cheaper - I doubt it!

@SchoolDilemma17 its a private company with lots of nurseries that makes a fortune having looked on companies house, so I’m not buying that they ‘can’t afford’ to stop adding bogus charges

The problem is funding usually covers stuff wages, pensions and employer NI and not much else.
The nursery will have to cover things like staff training, IT systems, phone costs, electricity gas and water, cleaning products, all toys and materials, indoor and outdoor equipment and maintenance of it all. Then rental/business/waste and council costs etc and then a redundancy fund incase the whole thing goes bust.