Childminders charging for my holidays

[Eunhae]

Hi team,
Do your childminders charge full price when both you and them take holidays?

Do you get any discount when you take time.off with advance notice?

I have told my childminder we only need childcare the first two weeks of Decmeber after she has told us she is taking the full week of 23/12 off but we need to pay full that week.
I asked for a discount on the third week but she has said she will charge the full 22 days in Decmeber even though we are actually only using 10, and only have 17 available.

Thoughts? Advice? I obviously want to keep good with her, but she seems to think she is an employee rather than self employed claiming every expense including 25% of her home rent!

What did you agree to in the contract?
You can't agree one thing and then decide to do another.

They may charge on the basis that 'my day rate is £60, that includes 4 weeks off' or 'my day rate is £65, any leave I take is unpaid'

(numbers just for example, but my point being that the costs over a year may work out the same)

Usually you pay for the space like a nursery or rent instead of pay-as-you-go.

This should all have been set out in your contract before starting.

Paying for your holidays is completely normal. You may not be using the space but it is open for you to use.

For childminder holidays- some charge, some don't, some charge half fees. When I was looking i found those which didn't charge, tended to have a slightly higher hourly rate and essentially on an annual basis it by and large evened out.
Any which charged had a clause saying they took x number of days.

If this helps, my childminder doesn’t charge when they are off, and charges a retainer of 50% on days my child is off as my two are term time only.

I'm a childminder, my contract states no charge for my time off, your time off you pay in full. That place is booked and reserved for you, whether you choose to use it or not because I can't fill a space ad-hoc.
But this should all be clearly set out in your contract, which you shouldn't have signed if you weren't happy. As you say, she's not an employee and is therefore free to set her own terms.

In my experience childminders will ALWAYS charge for your holidays - charging for her own is less usual. But what does your contract say? Did you sign up to that? It's possible she just has a single week like that at Christmas, in which case in the grand scheme of things is that worth changing childminder over?

Pay or risk losing your place.

I get charging for when we're on holiday, but given we pay £100 per day, five days a week, charging for all bank holidays and her own holidays does seem steep. I was actually just expecting a discount for either my week off or hers. There will be no food etc prepared so it will cost her less.
I've been sending my kid for 6 months and with the Christmas week, that is actually only 2 bank holiday days, I will have paid £2,000 for the four weeks I couldn't send my kid in this time.

Like you say, will need to stomach it or look elsewhere..

I think it is easier for you and the childminder to have regular payment per month rather than recalculating for hols. And if she has other children the food saving of making 3 lunches/dinners instead of 4 will be negligible.

The alternative is that she increases the daily rate slightly and doesnt charge for holidays but accross the year it would work out the same.

Understand it is more annoying when only using 1 week childcare in dec but paying for 4.

Hopefully she gives plenty of notice for hols and you can take your family hols at the same time when possible.

That's something to negotiate before you agree to it, not after.

Our childminder used to charge us for when they went on holidays and when we did I thought that was the norm!

But what does your contract say OP? This should all have been laid out beforehand.

I wouldn’t pay for the days she’s not available.

I don’t understand why people stick up for those who provide childcare when they are charging for days they are not available for example bank hols…

My boyfriend is a gardener, he doesn’t charge on bank holidays if he doesn’t work them, it’s mental.

Self employed people are free to set whatever terms they like. Don't sign the contract if you don't like the terms. Other childcare providers are available. I'm sure you boyfriend wouldn't appreciate it if his clients wanted to negotiate his pricing structure after the fact.

And does that include planned holidays? Or is there anything about that in the contract? If not then you don't pay for her holiday days, surely. I'm not surprised at all that you've to pay for your own.
I've known of everything from no payment for cm holidays, full pay and half pay.

We always paid full weeks for bank holidays as we felt it was the right thing to do. We were being paid for that day. SiL is a cm tho and had been treated badly on occasjon so I probably went the other extreme to make sure our cm felt well treated.

If your job said they had no work for you this week, so wouldn't pay you, would you be happy?

I don't agree with charging for days you don't work but anyone who is self employed can set their own payment terms.
It's up to their customers to decide if they'll accept them or not. If the op has signed a contract agreeing to those terms then she may have to suck it up while she looks for a different childminder.
It's also worth considering that there are many different ways to present payment terms - a childminder who isn't charging for her holidays may have a higher daily rate.

I wouldn’t sign that. I u destined how the contract works, but it’s my opinion it’s not fair and if you work Mondays you’re pretty stuck because it’s seems like the rule of thumb in the sector.

I do understand that, I just don’t think ts right (charging when not working).

No! I would pay for my own holidays, the CM wouldn’t be able to fill the spot for a week or so.

Mine went to nursery and we had to pay 50% for holidays, even bank holidays.
Charging full price is a bit cheeky imho but I guess good childminders are hard to find so maybe she knows she can charge it because it's less hassle for you to just pay than find someone else.
She should have a holiday policy clearly stated when you agree to use her really

Surely this is normal? We have a minimum number of holidays per year legally that needs to be taken. If she is self employed she either charges enough to cover these non working days putting up your price paid every day, or charges you the same each month to cover the holidays. It works out the same