COVID-19 nursery closure and refund

[justthisreally]

I have 3DCs in a private nursery. A staff told me today that they are getting themselves ready for the closure in the event of government directive. I asked if parents will be asked to pay for the period of closure. She said that all depends on what their head office decides when the time comes.

I'm self employed. And if I need to look after my DCs, I worry that I will have no income but have this huge nursery cost?

AIBU to expect my private nursery to not charge (including refund for the fees paid in advance) in case of closure?

I will be happy to pay nursery for the first month or two, as long as I know that they are paying their staff full pay, and not SSP.

Same with out of school club - I know it will go bust if they need to close long term, so will pay for as long as I can.

If people don’t continue to pay their nursery fees there will be no nursery to return to when the pandemic is over.

This is what I genuinely don't understand...
I get people are pissed off at paying for a service that's not going to be available BUT what happens when the nursery re-opens and we all stop self isolating and you need childcare again? Will you find yourself a new nursery? Do you suddenly no longer need childcare? If everyone refuses to pay their fees the nursery may go bust (they're already struggling).

I would home for a minimal reduction as a goodwill gesture to cover food etc. The nursery charge me £11.50 for DS’s meals- I certainly won’t be willingly paying for all of that, but will happily pay a proportion to cover the cook’s wages. The proportion that isn’t food, I guess we’ll just have to pay 🤷‍♀️

If/when my nursery closes and they say we have to pay the full amount I'll give our months notice there and then, and she won't be back. DD is due to move onto school nursery in September, I'll just start her there earlier when everything reopens as she can start anytime from now.
We don't know how long this is going to go on for, a couple of weeks then fair enough but what if it's 6 months? We wouldn't be able to survive financially if I'm not working (so not getting paid) plus having to pay full nursery fees.
If the staff are only getting SSP then surely the nurseries will be quids in charging the full amount, taking into account they will not be using electricity, water, food, any other supplies etc. I wouldn't mind paying a contribution to cover their basic costs and to hold the price but if nurseries try and make a profit out of this it is a joke. And if all other parents decided to do what my plan is they won't reopen anyway. Nurseries can either work with parents or screw them over.

Place not price.

We wont be paid our salary plus babysitting. Out nursery dont pay sick pay at all. We've been told that this will be holiday or unpaid leave. I imagine knowing our company that parents will still be paying though.

A good time to point out that nursery staff are generally on nmw, with often no sick pay in their contract. That they have to stay unpaid if parents are late picking up or want to have a detailed handover despite only turning up 1 minute before their child's scheduled finish time. That as well aa caring for the children at nmw, we often have to do proper cleaning at the end of the day if our cleaner is off sick or our company refuse to pay for one. It would be lovely if our job was 8-5 just playing with babies but its generally 7.45-5.20 despite only being paid 8-5 spending time writing up observations, cleaning etc that there wasnt time to do during our paid working hours.

Why can’t we moan about it when times are hard GreenWheat? Some of us lost our jobs when we had kids and the only work we have been able to pick up is casual work / contractor work etc? We’ve struggled having to pay nursery when they closed for snow and we had to pay full fees, despite me then earning nothing to be off with the kids. At least that was just a few days, this could be weeks or more!

Fine to have your full refund OP, if you want the nursery to shut forever & no nursery to be available to you in future.
This is why folk are saying don't shut down everything.
This is what "The economy" means. And trying to minimise damage it.

"The Economy" doesn't mean fatcat bankers and CEOs of FTSE100 companies.

It means 67% of the economy, small & medium enterprises.

WheresTheEvidence - that’s absolutely shocking. If they’re not charging the parents that’s one thing (although pretty shitty IMO to not offer sick pay), but to charge them and still not pay you is absolutely disgusting.

I'm pretty sure my children's nursery is a small business, not part of a chain.

As I said, maybe if people who are being paid as normal during the shutdown keep paying fees, it would make up for those who are not being paid and are therefore not able to pay fees. We'd all have to be honest though!

Mine hasn’t said what it will do in the event of closure but will not be charging for 7 day exclusions.

Some people are stark raving mad! Of course you don't pay a business that doesn't provide a service! Even as an employee I won't be paid if I need to care for my toddler during the day instead of working. I won't pay my cleaner if she cannot come. I won't pay the window cleaner if he cannot come. That's called real life. i won't pay the shop if it's closed. I won't pay my Internet provider if they cut me off. I was speaking to some of my clients yesterday who run nurseries and they were trying to figure if they could pay their staff full pay for a short period of closure. It's pretty obvious that they don't intend on charging parents in full otherwise the question wouldn't be there.
I may consider part paying on a voluntary basis if I can afford it to help them keep afloat.

Let me spell it out in very clear terms.

If it is in the contract that parents still pay during unforeseen closures, it is because if you don't, there won't be a nursery to go back to.

Most of our insurance companies are refusing to pay out because COVID19 wasn't a notifyable illness when the cover was initially taken out. We will close permanently.

Notifiable*

It’s depends what the contact says. If it’s says fees are still to be paid in the event of closure due to xyz, then really, you signed the contract agreeing to it. It’s shit I admit, but your other option is to pull out your dc but how will you manage when this is over? There’s no win win in this situation at all. As much as some parents are worrying about this, I imagine there are many owners looking at the figures each night to see how they can possibly keep going.

Thank you for all advice.

Contract doesn't specify this.
No help from DCs' father.

I'm largely self employed but also am an employee for a small portion of my work for which I've been told that I will only be allowed to take unpaid leave if I need to stay at home to look after kids.

The nursery fee is over £4,000 per months for the 3DCs. If it is a few hundreds pounds per months and if the closure is going to be only for a week or two I wouldn't worry. But looking at how other countries are expending the initial closure, I could be looking at a very high cost with no income.

They have a 6 weeks notice period. Maybe I should serve notice ASAP and just figure out whatever happens later...

DCs are in a day nursery that doesn't have school holidays.

I’d encourage you to write to your mp. There has to be different provision in place for nurseries and if there isn’t government support, there will either be widespread collapse of nurseries or financial hardship for working parents. It’s more challenging than shutting schools.

I'd be very interested to see a nursery contract specifying that in the event of a closure for an indeterminate period of time due to unforeseen circumstances fees remain payable. If this even exists it'd be slammed down as an unfair term anyway.
If it's says 'for up to 2 weeks' or sth then fair enough.
Pretty sure our contract with nursery is silent on the subject.

Flights are being cancelled all over the world - shit for the flight companies but Im still expecting to get my money back...
Something like this is shit for everyone: employees who are laid off with no pay, small businesses which cannot run, even bigger businesses. Just because it's shit doesn't mean I'm going to pay for a service I don't receive.

I’d encourage you to write to your mp. There has to be different provision in place for nurseries and if there isn’t government support, there will either be widespread collapse of nurseries or financial hardship for working parents. It’s more challenging than shutting schools.

This! If you are actually concerned about this situation then write to your MP/MSP/whoever and raise the situation which nurseries and after school clubs face (same rules and regs, same insurance, same problems) if they are forced to close by the government.

It's easy to say "why are they special" but think through what would happen to working parents if the childcare providers collapse. There will be a serious shortage, and those who do survive will probably have done so through large amounts of borrowing and so will have to raise fees so they can make the repayments. In time new providers might step in, but each of them will have to go through the registration process which takes 6 months typically. It won't be fixed quickly.

If people don’t continue to pay their nursery fees there will be no nursery to return to when the pandemic is over.

If nurseries continue to charge parents who are unable to earn money during this time, when they eventually reopen, they may find they have no customers as the parents may have lost their business. There has to be a bit of understanding from both sides.

The salient point is whether the government will continue to fund 15 and 30 hours so that nurseries still have some income.
Many nursery workers are minimum wage and part time and therefore don’t earn enough to qualify for ssp

Do people not understand contracts? Unless they gave insurance you have to pay. What’shard to grasp about that

If you don't understand consumer law, please do not comment. Unfair terms are not enforceable. And no contract will say "if we have to close indefinitely because of a pandemic we will still charge you" (they probably will in future, but it still won't be enforceable, as it's clearly an unfair term to charge someone indefinitely for a service you cannot provide.

The Which? website has very good resources on consumer law.

If a nursery is shut for a day because of snow, that's one thing.

If a nursery is shut for 3 months because of this, that is very different.

If people don’t continue to pay their nursery fees there will be no nursery to return to when the pandemic is over

I don't disagree so would suggest some sort of half-way house agreement where parents pay say half fees. But nurseries cannot compel payment for something they are not doing.

Of course you have to pAy. Im dreading this as i like you dont get paid if i dont work and nursery fees feels like double hit.