Nursery Fees Increase - 15% (!!)

[PieMistress]

Hi,

Just wondering if anybody else had experienced an increase in their nursery fees lately?

I have just received a letter to advise (with one months notice) that our fees will increase to £43.50 a day (from £39.50) plus an additional £2 a day to cover an early drop off of 7.30am (as opposed to 8am). So now an extra £6 a day/£123 a month/£1470 a year !!!

I feel sick!

How much do others pay per day (DS is 1yr old and goes full time) and have you had an increase in fees lately?

Thanks
P (off for a large glass of red!)

I booked nursery place for dd and on her trial day they gave me all the forms. I'd paid 8 months before a whole month's fees so was rather shocked they hadn't been in touch and I was going to have to find £100 extra a month. I actually didn't like the nursery and it was just one of many reasons dh and I chose to remove dd and place her with a fab, far more flexible, and cheaper childminder.

I drop dd at nursery on Friday mornings at 8am (now she is 3 she does 3 mornings a week at 2 different pre schools so I can claim my free hours). I pick her up at 1.15am and it costs £20 - this includes snack and a full cooked lunch. Fees did increase by 2.5%. The morning session is until 1pm but I finish work at 1pm so the manager agreed dd could stay until 1.15pm. She hasn't charged me any extra which surprised me.

CM hasn't raised fees in almost 2 years so I'm presuming she will at some point.

Has anybody else been stunned / baffled / gobsmacked by the fact that childcare costs can be as much as a second mortgage and a huge proportion of your salary, yet when you are asked by Building Societies, Credit Card Companies and Banks to summarise your outgoings for the purpose of securing a loan, they are not interested in childcare costs?
They ask for utility bills, council tax, any other loans, but the fact that you are spending nearly £1000 a month on childcare so that you can remain in employment, they're not bothered?

I feel quite lucky that my nursery fees have only gone up by about 4% but given that they're extortionate to start with, I think they couldn't have asked for much more!! I pay about £61.50 per day for three days and it really is quite an expense.

Fortunately, I spaced out my children so that we only ever had 2 at nursery at the same time - it was quite a shock to the system when I first enquired about nursery fees for twins - the fees were about twice as much as our mortgage at the time!!!

Since we had our 2nd, I have only just been breaking even by returning to work. Am now on maternity with #3 and can't possibly go back until DS1 starts school in September. Nursery fees have increased recently and I feel slightly sick when I think about them. The thought of staying home makes me feel worse though! We really didn't even think about the cost of childcare with any of the kids. Worth every penny.

I work for a public sector organisation in a poor outer London borough as an admin assistant on a very modest wage, and we have had no increase in cost of living for two years. We are of course unlikely to get one this financial year either. My employers are flexible despite the low wages I get and I could work full-time but I can find no after-school care for DS1. Therefore, I am stuck working nearly part-time so I can drop off and collect him. My baby's nursery charge for a full day though I collect him at 3:30. The fees which currently equal 70% of my monthly income (4 days) are going up the full 20% to cover VAT in April. I'm beginning to think that it's a conspiracy against working parents. I don't begrudge paying a fair price for good quality childcare because childcare is very important work, but at the same time these huge taxable sums are poured into the economy by parents without relief. The childcare vouchers of £243 before tax are inadequate (for London at least, as most people pay about £600+ for childcare pcm - split between two working parents that is still at least £100 short of what it should be) and there is no government assistance, and no one is fighting our corner. so I object to it being such a huge drain on our household income and being taxed on the shortfall. It's a disgrace and a smack in the face of every hard working parent.
There should be more state run nurseries whose costs are in line with regular people's financial reality. We need government to engage in joined up thinking here....

Ive just got a letter about the invrease in fees its going up by a £1 a day to £39 and £178 a week because you get a discount if you use 5 days a week. Its less for the over 2s because of the change in staf ratio.

Ripp, I wish I was only paying 600pcmcia on London, mine are just shy of 1k... But not for the love if mqn would I send my child to any nursery this government had set up!

Ours has just gone up by 2%

we've just had our 2nd fee increase in three months (announced by the nursery manager who has just returned from mat leave herself and who has obviously decided the fee increase put in place by the deputy effective January isn't enough, as of 1st March we'll be paying £46 a day for DD who is 12m.

Ripp I agree, and we need more nurseries/CM's which offer more than 8-6 for those of us who have to commute as well!

Ours have been a bit creative, by telling us that they're not increasing fees this year (and they didn't last year) but in order to help them to do this they're going to be shut for the whole week before Easter. Fine if you're going on holiday then anyway, but we'd just booked a holiday for 2 weeks later to avoid the school holidays! Slightly annoying, but a good thing as long as they really do keep fees down instead of just raising them by even more next time.

DS2 who is 4, goes full time. His fees are heavily subsidised by the allowances for over 3s...but we had a letter the other day inviting us to a meeting as the local authority is cutting the amount they spend. I have no idea how much this will cost, but I am guessing that it will be a lot.

RippTorn you aren't being charged VAT are you

I am fairly certain (I run a small nursery) that childcare is completely exempt from VAT......

Mine has just gone up from £31.50 to £33 a day for a 1 year old, and it's a really lovely nursery. They also provide all the nappies, wipes, and formula or cows milk.
Didn't realise there was such wild variation in costs.

Our fees went up from £184 for a full week to £200, in January. That is for a 2-5 yo. The daily rate is £46.

Baby rate is £230 for a full week, or £52 a day.

Luckily we get one lot of cc vouchers, the 3 yo discount and we only have one child, who is going to school in September. I don't know how people with more than one manage.

I live in Bristol and pay about £47 per day for my 2yr old full-time 8:00-17:30 place at nursery. The price includes lunch, snacks and tea. It does not include nappies.
This works to (yes) £930 a month.

I booked the place 10 months ahead and the fee rose by almost £100 two months after my daughter started nursery.

And I should think myself lucky according to the nursery management fees for new registrations rose this year by another £100, with lunches charged separately now.

Childminders costs are roughly the same, around £5 per hour, so for a full-day-full-time place a nursery is a better choice.

Are all the prices other posts mention London prices?

Ours fees have gone up by just over 2% to £70 per day for 0-3 yr olds and £66/day for 3-5 yr olds (8:00-18:00, Surrey).

[Gulp]

Childcare is shockingly expensive

Ours went up this month by 6% to £38 a day. No increase last year but went from 34 to 36 two years ago. So that's about 11% in two years which I think is just about bearable in principle - I do want the staff to get a decent wage. Jolly painful on the pocket though and in a climate where most parents are not getting any rise - well it's not great.

For me, some of the problem is the price of food, it has gone up so much & I won't feed the children rubbish

The fees go up but staff wages stay the same and they do not put money back into the setting ( proper food, new equipment etc)

Ours is £32 a day - I haven't heard if it's going up this year yet. It went up from £30 to £32 last year.

SW London is obscene - nothing under £1350 a month. Count yourselves lucky ladies.