Beavers subs and absences/school holidays

[BusyLizzie61]

Hi all,

Can I ask how much your children's subs are for Beavers? Does £4/1 hour sound about average?

Also, does anyone know if they're still due if the child is absent due to illness etc and during school holidays?

Thank you.

It's a set amount a term here regardless of how many sessions are attended.

£40 a term here, so a little less than £4 a session.
Payment at the beginning of the term (yeah right, like I not constantly chasing).

I've seen termly payments and monthly payments, including August (so it's averaged put over the year).

Still payable if they miss for whatever reason... Still need to pay hall upkeep, leaders training, census payments, equipment etc.

Current group is £25 a term. Last group was £10 a month.

Fees will cover groups cost, so it isn't uniform across country.

We pay £15 per month, regardless of absence, school holidays or illness. Even covid last year didn't get us out of paying.
That said it's worth every penny, the leaders go over and above so I will pay up without question

£10 a month for us, Cubs now but Beavers and Scouts were the same.
I don't know if we have to but we pay all through the year regardless of attendance and paid through each of the lockdowns too. My DC have got so much out of going it's an absolute bargain IMO.

£50 a term here. Worth it though - DS loves it!

We pay £10 a month all year including holidays as cost spread evenly. Still pay if they don’t attend.

£25 x4 in a year.

Amazing value for money.

It'll vary between areas. Our Scouts subs is £3.50, which you pay for your place each week, regardless of whether you go or not. It covers the hall, insurance, membership, badges etc and is an absolute bargain for what they get out of it.

£8.75 a month here. You pay regardless of whether you’re ill, away etc.

£8 per month for all 12 months a year. It went up from £6 a few years ago

Ours is £40 per term, which works out at less than £4 per session. You can opt to pay by monthly direct debit (spread evenly over the year). The full term subs is payable regardless of how many sessions you attend.

I know to some it might seem unfair to have to pay if your child doesn't attend but the budgets are really tight. Plus all the admin is done by the leaders who are volunteers so having to take payments every week (and then bank them/record them etc) would be even more unpaid work for them.

£50 a term (for all scouting groups here). Don't pay over summer or holidays. It's a direct debit to avoid the chasing! It's well worth it though and both my girls have loved beavers, cubs and now scouts.
We didn't pay last year over covid and they still put sessions on over the summer holidays to make up for missing so much. They really are fabulous people and it really upsets me that some parents give them a hard time (without of course volunteering to help on the parent rota etc).

You aren't 'paying' to go. You are contributing to the running costs. Scouting is a voluntary organisation - so all those leading the groups are volunteers. Your group will be a charity. You pay towards rates, water, electricity, rent, insurance, national scout levy etc etc these are the same whether you go or not. So once you join you do have to pay regularly whether or not your child attends that week.

£2.50 a week term time only. It was £2 until just before lockdown.

Thank you all.

A huge variation in costs. But it does look like the £4/hour in school term time only is £156/year or £13/calendar month. And appears to be the most expensive.

I appreciate that there are overheads etc that need maintaining and paying etc. But the cost does seem to be a lot for things like when a child will be recovering from operations etc. Though I'd be willing to pay it if its definitely term time only.

I used to run guides and couldn’t offer a discount for illness but if it’s a child having pre-planned long term absence for medical reasons I would look into offering a small discount of the cost of materials (hall costs still have to be paid and everyone who has a place in the group needs to contribute)

We had €2/session (90 minutes in winter, 2 hours in boating season) for Cubs, which we weren't strict about so never had money for badges, materials for crafts, prizes etc.

Now we ask for €20/term (3 terms a year), and try to only charge 2 terms or only €10 for the final term if finances allow.

This covers our general runNing costs over the year, including tea/coffee for parents volunteering on shore duty in boating season, various costs for outings, occasional stationary or equipment or materials costs, first necker for each Cub (replacements are charged at cost price of €10 - the other Cub unit and both Scout unit charge for all including 1st), and some reduction to cost of overnight events if we have enough in the kitty.

Last year we only charged once, and we didn't charge 1st term this year, both due to COVID. But we needed to charge this term and will need next term as we had run down to almost nothing and had dropped a number of sets of things to Cubs houses to operate remotely.

We try to account for hardship cases (when families can't afford it) and if we know someone will be absent for a significant period we will hold their place without subs (but annual registration/insurance costs still need to be paid).

Different groups choose to organise their finances slightly differently, as has been shown by this thread - weekly, monthly, termly; some pay for 12 months, others just for term time; some will include things like the necker and badges when they start but others charge a joining fee or get parents to buy them; some have a high rent bill others don't ; the annual membership fee varies a fair bit, as counties and Districts add on different levies; some groups have a big annual fundraiser - say the local community bonfire - that takes care of most of their expenses, or regularly run fundraisers to help funds, so don't have to ask parents for so much in subs.
Some groups charge less weekly, but then ask the parents to pay the annual membership fee.

However, if you have a child that you know is going to be in hospital / recovering from an operation, or operations, then talk to the Group. Every Group I know would suspend the subs if you asked, or at least reduce them to the money that goes towards the annual membership fee in those circumstances.

I know when mine were Beavers / Cubs / Scouts / Explorers, it was by far and away the best value of anything they ever did. Far cheaper than most things.

They can't possibly give refunds if your child is off sick because it would be an administrative nightmare for the volunteers who aren't paid at all for their time to run it.

If you don't want to pay, give up the place to another child.

At the end of the day, it’s a voluntary organisation and they can charge as they see fit and you can choose whether you want to pay it and let your child go or not.

Not true Clymene Every group I've ever known anything about will do their utmost to support individual circumstances.

Absolutely, all Leaders (and the treasurer and other trustees) are volunteers, but usually volunteers who are prepared to do what they can to include everyone.

£9 a month for our scout group but we don't have to pay rent so may be a bit cheaper than others. I'd say £10 a month is about average.
I'm the treasurer of the group so understand the finances. When you become a member of the group , the group have to pay "membership fees" to the Scout Organisation for each member on roll at a certain point in the year. This usually comes to thousands a year and is probably the groups biggest expense. So whether you attend or not - those fees need paying. You are not paying for the session - you are paying to be a member and for the other fixed expenses the group has.

Incidentally - our group suspended subs after the first lockdown and they will be suspended to September. Most parents voluntarily carried on paying.
If someone wanted to join the group but were not in the position financially to pay, we would probably subsidise them. We have not had this happen but discussed it and we would not stop a child joining just because their parents couldn't afford it.

I was treasurer for our scout group for 5 years.
Our group is £40 a term. So £120 a year. Payable regardless of attendance. Any trips camps etc are extra and only payable if participating

Currently the annual membership fee that is paid higher up the chain is just under £60 a year (this is divided between area/district/scouts cymru/and the main U.K. HQ)
That leaves £60 a year per child. We don’t have our own scout but so pay £20 each night we use the village hall. (But then those with own huts have rates/utilities/upkeep/cleaning etc to pay for)
Then badges costs anything from 20p to over £1 each.
Then we have to have insurance for the equipment that is stored in a shed, and then extra insurance for additional helpers.
Then equipment needs constantly repairing/replacing.
Things like gas when using the stoves, and then supplies used during meetings or paying for an external provider to come and run an activity (or often just a donation eg we have a local bird man come with his owls etc and we donate some money towards food etc for them)
Then the volunteers needs training. Some is provided free of charge by the scouts association but we pay £15 per person for first aid for example.
Then we provide the Neckers free of charge which cost us £3.50 each

So if you pay £4 a session for 37 weeks a year. £1.62 goes towards your child’s annual membership fee, £1 goes towards hall hire, say 38p towards a badge they may have gained,
That leaves £1 a week for all the other things above or the hot chocolate and biscuits served at the end of a hike, or the marshmallows and chocolate biscuits to make s’mores on firefighting night, or the craft materials to make a Mother’s Day card and present, or the plant pots and seeds and soil for another activity etc etc

I think it’s excellent value for money really.