Private school: what additional expenses should I prepare for?

[Epli]

We are considering sending our child to a private primary school. We are aware of the general tuition fees and fees for music tuition, but what other expenses we should prepare for?

Our fees include lunch, after school activities and non residential trips.
Extras include ; boarding, residential trips, uniform,bus, speech and drama lessons, instrument lessons, musical groups eg brass band.

Uniform typically adds up to £600 for prep school excluding shoes / trainers / boots / hockey stick etc.
I buy most uniform second hand so it's typically less than half price. Second hand is well used at our school.

Exam fees

Was just going to say the same thing!

Ask the school for a list of uniforms required from years a-z in our school nursery was one uniform. Then reception to year 2 another then changed for year 3/4 another change for year 5/6 and a further change for years 7/8. I spend about £1k per dc a year however I buy new. Most mums claim to be being sustainable when they go off to the second hand shop. I would go there but my dc destroys their new uniform, any further wear and it's got no chance. Check what prices the biggest blazer is. I had to hyperventilate somewhere in private on hearing the final years blazer price.

On top of those changes, they add stuff to the sports kit every year and inevitably stuff goes missing as well. We have several uniform sports socks at a wonderful £6 a pair,Also try to pin down a current parent and ask what is actually needed. We bought a leotard as it was 'on the list' but dc didn't use it at all. £40 down the drain yay!

Ask what type of shoes are required ours specifies acceptable looks and brands.

Not all trips are in the fees, again check.

Some clubs are chargeable in our school despite having few included clubs every night, we've still ended up paying extra for some because 'mum everyone's going to that club though'

Birthday parties. One thing no one told me. Omg the amount of £££££ I spend on other peoples presents. Give a £5 gift card in our school and you'll be ostracised for life.

Fund raisers. I'm tight and avoid these.

School fairs. £5 for the coconut shy anyone?

BS mufti days. Bane of my life. Every time there's a 'theme' for the love of god wish they'd stop this. The themes are rather random and local stores regularly run out of whatever the theme is on each occasion I know this because I'm always last buying stuff

Holiday childcare. Joy of joys. Longer holidays. We've just had a wonderful month off.

Any future accidental? Dc. Make sure you can afford the whole time at school and for as many dc as you have or plan to have. Seen these things go a bit awry on occasion.

Also count in the fee rises. Ours was 10% last year. Cue a further hyperventilating episode.

Ski trips is the big one .... my 7 yr old is going in a couple of month away for a week - practically half the class is going

Everything else is relative which ever prep you go to

Usually a week away up to £300 - 500 a weeks residential once per year

But I'm going to sound very grumpy now but class kitty £35 and expected to pay.
I prefer to buy gifts for the teachers that exactly mean something to me / my children but that's on top of the class kitty..... as everyone turns up with a personal present too.

Breakfast club £5 and £5 per 30 mins per child for ASC - but it easily adds up to hundreds each term

Oh and the school coach is ££££

Sports uniform - my kids all have 4 tops - plus base layers - what ever happened to a polo t shirt 😂😂😂 plus astros, football, indoor trainers, outdoor trainers and spikes - makes me laugh and they get lost 😡 plus all the hockey sticks , cricket bats blah blah the list goes on

Second hand blazers £40 - new £110 - you will need to keep sizing up every 1.5 yrs

Oh and do remember tutors as nearly every person (80% plus in a class has a tutor) has them £60 for a hr

Plus fees to try for the exams in senior schools £150 - £300 I've paid in different senior schools

Our class kitty is £50 each! 😧

You do know that private primary schools don’t produce better educational outcomes, barely follow the curriculum and state schools are free!

There’s a benefit at secondary but don’t waste thousands on getting Hogwarts to teach DC how to do its times tables which the local CofE does absolutely free of charge and no pressure to install a swimming pool.

I'm surprised at those saying there's not many additional costs.

At my school EVERYTHING was extra - trips, coaches, locker keys, locker deposit, lab coat, art apron, every text book, meals, snacks, wrap around, exam entry, extra curricular activities, first aid award, food ingredients, clubs, pottery kiln fee, residentials, photocopying, music scores .....the uniform costs were insane and everything had to come from the in school shop. Sports kit was legion - every bit of kit for every sport known to humankind...

I remember seeing the fees bills sometimes and it just blowing my mind that nothing was included or missed.

Total waste of money. So glad my DC all go to state!

Hi OP - you need to check with the school. Some of the smaller, less well known privates publish a fee rate that's lower and then stick everything else on top.
Our prep fees are toppy, but most extras are optional - i.e. there's not much you'd have to accept on top if you didn't want to. Uniform costs you've outlined sound about right, but the uniform tends to be good quality and hard wearing. All parents at ours buy some stuff second hand. Make sure you have sewn in labels on everything and then if things get lost they should come back.
Ballpark for us for extra is about 10% on top of the normal fee.

And to go against the grain - I am not aware of anyone who tutors at the moment at our prep. I'm sure there are some but doubt it's many, as they finish school so late anyway and are there on Saturday too.
Parties and birthday presents are by no means flashy - with one or two exceptions, which people tend to find slightly amusing!
Class kitty is 30 quid and nobody really brings personal presents except maybe a bottle of wine if a teacher has played a particularly significant role in the child's term etc.

Thank you everyone!

@Ilovechoc12 I am a bit baffled by 80% of class needing tutors - is it because of exams?

Yep it starts from yr 4.

It's a nightmare.

I'd go a through co - Ed school 4-18 and walking distance from home if I'd of known .....

Miss out the evil 11 plus 😂😂😂

Our friend's DC go to an all through but you still have to sit exams for transfer to the senior school. Ostensibly for scholarship purposes but they have known children not 'invited to stay' on and as a result a lot of them all tutor from yr 5 latest.

Absolutely barking.

Not many compulsory extras at my DC school. Just lunches and school coach are the big ones (but both of those are optional of course). It’s a popular London day school and the blazer is…£35. Cheap as chips and seems to be made of recycled plastic bottles!!

DD started at a local prep this year- her uniform and sports kit (new) cost about £1100. We’ve been topping up from the second hand school shop. Also, if you can, check what is actually needed- maybe ask other parents. We bought a leotard and tights, for eg and DD didn’t do gymnastics last term, nor will she do it this term, so she’ll likely have outgrown them by the time she comes to use them (if ever!)
And we bought everything from the school shop, but Astro trainers, for eg, could have been bought cheaper elsewhere.

We pay for school transport (door to door) which is approx £500/term

Trips are an additional expense, added to the termly bill - DD has only been to the pantomime so far

We have insurance to pay for DD’s musical instrument, but this is minimal

There have been the odd fundraising event- like a Macmillan cake sale, Christmas jumper day, but they are “bring £1” events

You should also prepare for the annual fee increases - allow for 10% +

It depends on the school as you will have noticed from replies. In our case, main added extras are lunches, trips and wrap around/clubs. In prep, there is also a technology cost for personal laptops but not as fancy as the poster upthread who has Macbooks. There are things like gifts for teachers which are done as class - we give £10 at Christmas and £10 end of year

Uniform is significantly more than state sector but we pass a lot around between us and school also passes second hand items on

As far as tutors go - it is worth establishing the attitude from school and other parents when you view the school towards this. In some schools, children are heavily tutored for 11+, some through schools have high portions of children heavily tutored (which makes no sense to me) and others have more laid back attitude. If the school is academic and has good 11+ results, it is worth finding out if this is because all are tutored or because of the school

Fee inflation of at least 5% per year, plus jumps at years 7 and 12 as a minimum
everyone buys uniform second hand

There is usually a second hand sale at the summer fete, so I would definitely go the summer before your child starts and kit out as much as you can 2nd hand

Lunches are usually extra. We pay around
£230/term/child for this.

Trips are extra - educational day trips plus residentials.

Obviously uniform.

Any extra like individual music lessons/ LAMDA drama/some clubs/wraparound care when in primary.

Depending on the school but SEN provision may cost you or diagnostic tests set by an outside provider or a peripatetic SEN teacher. (Not personal experience for us but other parents have had to in the schools we've used).

Exam fees for GCSES and A Levels.

I agree with this. My kids were at a well-known and academic London prep. No one was tutoring. Class kitty was about £30 but the idea was that this was instead of individual presents not as well as. Parties and presents were pretty normal (eg church hall and maybe an entertainer, £10-15 presents- obviously not suggesting this is normal for everyone).

What's included depends on the school and is worth checking. Everything was included at ours (lunches, day trips etc) except Y6 residential trip and optional things like instrumental lessons. Uniform was largely branded and so not dead cheap but there is a thriving second hand shop.

Friends of our's London state primary - they all have tutors from year 4/5 for the SATs?? Our country prep about 2 out of 20 children have tutors - either because they are at the low end and need extra help or they are at the top end and hoping to get into Westminster etc. Most people - no tutoring.

The key difference being the state school pupils are not already having an educational experience that is costing their parents thousands of pounds a year. (I personally cannot understand tutoring for SATS at all but maybe a London thing!)

But the point is that I cannot imagine how parents already paying through the nose for small classes and supposedly better educational experiences and outcomes can possibly not feel a bit rankled that they then feel the need to shell out in addition to that for even more tuition. Makes an absolute mockery of the fees in the first place! Parents topping up a free state education will be paying a fraction per year.

(I mean, I think it's all bonkers. The pushing, paying, striving, overscheduling and competitiveness What's your end goal really. But that's a different thread.)

HerringBoneBlanket our experience via friends in North London is they spend about £12k a year on 'enrichment activities / tutoring' which is what prep day school costs us outside of London. Also the mum gave up her job to 'so the school run'. Doing the school run turned out to mean 1 hour of work before school (spellings, maths, english, practising instruments) and then ferrying to the activities after work. So in my mind 'doing the school run' has cost her £100k per year which is way more than our school fees.
Houses within their state primary catchment area are all >£1MM so whilst ethnically diverse it is financially only for investment bankers etc. They are no GPs / teachers at their school.
I totally agree eye watering to pay school fees + tutoring which is why most families don't do it. London is a hot bed of tutoring whether they are private or state.