Childcare vouchers

[Mamulik]

I have constant problem with my childminder that she is not happy about childcare vouchers, because its usally take 3-4 working days to arrive on her bank account. I tried everything, but she is not happy. She saying that we dont pay her in time. What is your experience? please help!

I have asked (with some success) that you pay one month in cash, then hold that months voucher over until the next month & pay it earlier

You can do this in several ways; the easiest is to save up over several months until you have a months money

Is there no way you can arrange the transfer to start a few days earlier?

I get paid weekly and my employers arranged the transfer to go thru from their account every friday, as a result it was mondays or sometimes tues the funds were available.

They now arrange it for a wed so the cash is in my account every fri.

Generally CCV are paid out of that months salary - this doesn't work unless you are paid before about 24th of the month (assuming fees due on 1st)

Realistically they should be paid out of last months salary to allow for delays

Your contract with your childminder is such that you need to have paid by the date specified. If the voucher is not going through in time, you need to sort out alternative payment. As Katymac says, one way of doing it is to hold back a voucher, so that you have that voucher to use to pay the following months invoice.
So if you get your voucher towards end of November and your childminder invoices you in late December of January childcare, then you use the November voucher to pay the December invoice.

Another thing you may be able to arrange with your CM is a change in the billing date... so instead of billing at the end of the month, they bill part way through the month. However that may not suit your CM, so will be something to discuss, plus you will need to come to an arrangement of how you go about doing the initial payments.

Agree with everyone else. It is your responsibility to make sure that she gets the money on time. It si completely irrelevant to your CM when you make the payment, all that matters to her is when it gets to her bank account.

I'm not sure what you mean when you say that you have tried evenrything...

FWIW, this is what we do:

We pay our CM weekly and our contract specifies that we pay her on the Friday so our voucher payments are always booked to leave our account on the Monday to make sure that she always has the money in plenty of time. We've used a similar system for a previous CM who was paid monthly and again we always had a 4 day gap between when we paid and when the money was due. This works fine but it does mean that you always need a bit of credit in the system.

Thanks everybody, very useful information. I paid her with check, I really dont want any more troubles.

I'm sorry to hear this - it will work out a lot more expensive doing it this way. It is possible to make the vouchers work. Honest

I have voucher payments for three children coming in from two different companies. My contacts are all for monthly payment in advance on the first working day in the month. However, with parents who wish to pay by vouchers, I do contract them to trigger the payment three working days prior to the end of the previous month to ensure I have cleared funds in my account on the first of the month. When I started doing this, I thought is sounded a bit harsh but in most other forms of employment you get your money on pay day not three or four days later. None of my parents have quiblled about it and they have all got into the routine.