Not sure if this is the right place to post - school holidays and work

[janx]

I work p/t - 3 days a week. DD starts school in Sept and ds is 13 months and just started nursery. What I am trying to work out is whether it is going to be worth working when dd starts school (taking into consideration after school childcare costs and school holidays etc) - and prehaps taking ds out of nursery. What do you pay in afterschool fees? and what do you do with your kids during the holidays? I would be really interested in costs involved and how people cope

If you're only working 3 days a week, the cheapest option would be for you to do a kidshare, so you have someone else's child on your days off and they have yours for two of the days you're at work. Maybe your dh could work from home on the other one? When ds was little I did a lot of childsharing arrangements, also sent him to activity clubs which were quite cheap.

thanks mumblechum ...am looking at all options. Not sure I want to go down the kidshare route - I find my hands are full enough with my two - can't imagine looking after a third one !

Hi janx - I work 3 days a week in school holidays, and its always a bit of a worry getting childcare.

It will probably be a case of 'cobbling something together' like lots of other mums, there isn't a one-size-fits-all answer.
I use : kidshare/swaps, pay a friend for the odd day, DH takes some time off, I take some time off, dump them on granny/sister for a day, and finally when all else fails I pay for a summer camp/holiday scheme!

I have just given up work after having 3rd dc for this reason.

I also did 3 days and childcare costs were more than my wage.

Childminders are good for after school as they usually can accomodate school hols.

Have you checked with school if they do any ater school/holiday club ?

I work p/t (5 mornings) and have one child in nursery and 1 child in school. Because I work mornings I pick him up from school and DH takes him so we don't pay for before/after school care, although the school run breakfast and after school clubs which are "relatively" inexpensive.

Holidays wise DH and I split our holiday and send DS to the odd playscheme (again, not too expensive) and also do the odd day of "child swapping" (only the odd day though so it basically is just like DS's friend coming round). It is annoying with DD at nursery because we pay her nursery fees even if one of us has to take time off to look after DS.

I would imagine the cost of holiday/after school care would be less than your current childcare costs for your DD though?

Also remember that your DS fees may well drop when he gets to 2, plus he will get nursery grant when he is 3 (it's not actually that long away ...) so it may only be short term that money is tight.

... and if you do have to pay for childcare, as long as you use it for a minimum of 4 weeks and its OFSTED registered, you should claim your Tax Credit (but you probably knew that!)

Thanks everyone ....I think I secretly want to give up working

Cost of a/s clubs vary, depending on whether or not they provide any food but are usually somewhere between £6 and £10 per night with discounts for siblings.

Holiday schemes again vary but in this area (South East) they usually cost at least £10 per day and can cost as much as £16 per day so quite expensive.

oooh OK

All mine are now at school but when they weren't we had a lovely C/minder for 3 days/week. It was still well worth my working, even with 2 of them there.

DH and I both work 4 days/week, flexibly around school pick-ups. This is great of course. If not, our after-school club is £6 till 4.30, £8 till 6pm.

In hols we spread ur hols thin to cover as much as we can (eg I have 4 days hol in a week but only need 3 as DH is off one day anyway - so over a year I save a week).

Then we use a few lieu days for B Hol working, get the odd day from rellies (gran, uncle etc) or even pals if needed, and usually end up doing a week of hols club in summer.

BTW I think £10/day is a Bargain and £16 not bad. Some clubs here charge up to £24 (admittedly for a long 8am-6pm day).

Frankly it's a headache!

i work 2.5 days.two days are normal and usual, but the extra half they let me do as term time only, but i do the time in advance, so bank it ready.
another trick i have leaned is that it pays me not to work on a monday!
Most bank hols are on a monday, and now (quite recently)i also get given time back for the bank hol, as the girls who worked on a monday always got a short week when they occured by luck' but i missed out, and so challenged it.
so now i get half of the bank holiday hours back (i work half a week) each time, which means that i get 7.2 weeks holiday pa, rather than what was my usual 5.6 weeks. so really i can cover a lot of school hols now - especially because i dont use hol for the half day term time bit!
i hope i explained myself ok!
Its just that on good friday, and some years xmas hols i have to use some of that 7.2 weeks hol to book the bank hol off...

I have used an after school club and a childminder in the holidays. Both dh and I had a reaosnable holiday entitlement of 6 weeks ( bit more for dh) so we tried to cover as muich school holiday as we could. It is a significant expense, though