Childcare vouchers for Reception?

[gladders]

I was told on here ages ago that you could use the salary sacrifice vouchers (the £243 a month ones) to pay school fees until the child turned 5.

great news for us as dd is a July baby so we've been merrily savign up and have nearly her whole reception year covered already (at local indpendent school where she's already at the nursery) - only for school to tell me today that that is not correct.....

any input? I'm sure I'm right but now need to be able to prove this. Quite a major issue for us as if those vouchers go to waste and we have to pay fees in cash we will effectively have paid twice for this year.......

I think it depends on whether the school choose to accept them ,rather than it being an obligation. You should still get the Early Years funding to offset for those 3 terms, assuming the school meets the criteria.

Could it be confusion between salary sacrifice and govt funding fo nursery?

The info from the private school DD may be starting in september lists the fees and then says remember 3 and 4 yr olds receive govt funding.

The school that DS will go to accept vouchers for holiday clubs, but not school fees. You do get the govt funding until the term they are 5 though - so DS will get 2 terms

My DC's school accept the salary sacrifice vouchers for as long as you are legally allowed to use them (so until the term after your DC turns 5) as well as after that for wraparound care. They had to sign up to the particulalr scheme that DH's work uses, as there are various different ones. They charge £25 a term for extra admin costs.

You should ask the school if they will consider using them. Explain the situation, and that many others do. (You could phone round their direct competition and ask)

If the school won't, when its been explained, then tbh I wouldn't choose that school, it would show a lack of interest and care.

thanks for the prompt replies!

am not confused - i know that the LEA grant thing will continue until the term she turns 5 and that's great. I'm asking whether I can use the salary sacrifice vouchers towards the rest of the fees?

I had checked with my voucher co and they say yes - school is ofsted inspected so meets the criteria, and actually they did accept vouchers for my son's reception fees so i thought nothing of it until today.

it's too late to change our choice of school - am just wondering what other people's experiences have been? seems odd that they say they cannot accept them for reception when some schools do and they already accept them for nursery and for before and after school care?

Can I just clarify, DD turns five in Jan 2011 will her funding continue until easter 2011 or end dec 2010?

In the same situation and need to clarify this myself. My understanding is that if you pay in the vouchers already accrued before (and up to 1st Sept)this will show as a credit on your nursery account and can be carried over to 'part-pay' the reception fees......at least i'm hoping this is the case as after paying our summer term fees we will have around four months worth of vouchers left. I've also heard that you could return the vouchers to the provider and they would credit the cash amount to your acct (but not sure about this as surely everyone would take advantage of the non tax refund!). I would check with your voucher provider and the finance person at the school.

Childcare vouchers can be used up to statutory school starting age ie.until the term after a child turns 5 years old. Vouchers cannot be refunded or turned into cash: there would be tax issues otherwise given that these are paid as a salary sacrifice scheme. Note that some providers, eg. Care-4, will donate the balance of your account to charity if you do not use the account in an 18 month period. Any accrued vouchers are very useful in terms of paying for weeks of school holiday childcare and activity clubs.

arromofonesown - yes that's the advice i have had on here before and Accor had confirmed this - do you have a link to anything on line which backs this up though? The school seem to need persuading!

dixiechick - you'd need to double check with the school - in theory the LEA funding (distinct from the vouchers) should carry on up to and including the term they turn 5 - so that would be the Spring term for your duaghter?

Hi, just wanted to clarify the situation from a Childcare Voucher provider?s point of view. You can use Childcare Vouchers to pay for any registered childcare for children up to the age of 16 ? so not just for nursery or playgroups, but also childminders, out of school clubs and holiday camps.

You can use them to pay for Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS) costs for three and four-year-olds, over and above the free 12.5 hours a week (which will be going up to 15 hours a week in September). You can also accrue your vouchers and use them when you need them most, for example over the summer holidays.

In England, you can also use them to pay for out of school activities which are billed separately to compulsory education, providing they meet certain criteria. This could cover things like music lessons or football clubs.

As another Mumsnetter has said, though, carers ? in this circumstance, the school ? don?t have an obligation to accept Childcare Vouchers as payment. If they do accept Childcare Vouchers, they will also need to be registered with your Childcare Voucher provider to accept them but doesn?t cost them anything to get registered.

Agree with others - school can accept them if they choose to. We will certainly be using them for DD.

Worst case, if they won't take them for fees - might you be able to use them for after school care/ holiday clubs so that they are not entirely wasted?

Hi my DD2's school had not heard of CCV's and said they only applied to state schools!! I went and saw the Head and she agreed to register. She was fantastic and once she understood a bit more about them went out of her way to be accomodating. I am the only one at the school using them. DD2's in Reception and not due to turn 5 till August so will be using them until then. Be persistent with the school - it makes a big difference financially using them and its not that much extra work for them registering.

Good luck

Richmond

Checked today with DD's school to be and they will definitely accept the computershare vouchers until age 5 for school fees and then after that for aftercare/holiday club.

Why will you have paid twice?

My ds had vouchers for his whole first year, he was a May child.

I think OP means she has paid for the vouchers already but if she can't use them she will have to pay cash for the school fees and be left with several thousands of pounds worth of vouchers.

Yes they can be used for aftercare etc but if you don't need childcare they will be wasted. Some vouchers expire after a year and I don't believe they can be refunded.

Yes DD a Jan baby so entited to use vouchers until easter after she turns 5.

hi there - yes my concern was that we had been stashing away these vouchers and sacrificnig salary but were going to be unable to use them and were going to have to pay the full fees from our net salaries.

we don't really have any other significant childcare costs that these could be used for - after school clubs are currently coming to about £200 a term - so we'd struggle to use all the vouchers by the time they came to 16!

anyway have had confirmation from the voucher co (Accor) that we can use them to pay for her education til she turns 5. the school do accept vouchers (we are already paying nursery fees that way) - so i think it's just a case of a new over zealous bursar misinterpreting the rules. i have forwarded the email from the voucher co to her and am going to leave it at that - am aware that my drawing attention to myself in this way is probably not going to help build a good relation ship with the school. i will just quietly pay with the vouchers and refer her to the voucher co if she has any furtehr questions!

Computershare - which voucher co do you work for out of interest?

You can also get the vouchers refunded via your employer (you will have to pay tax on them though). I'm also with Accor and looked into this recently as I've amassed a few that I may not use.

I imagine Computershare works for Computershare! We use them and they used to be called Busy Bees.

doh! didn't know that was a voucher co name!

planetearth - that's good to know - at least the money is safe whatever happens.....