Nursery charging as we don't want to take up their place

[Dramajustfollowsme]

We applied for a nursery place at my work before dd was born as I was told there was massive demand. They only take children from 2 years old though. I've had dd in another nursery from 13 months when I went back to work.
Work nursery never, ever got back to us, no contract or anything. I wrote a letter to them as dd is very settled where si

Don't know where the rest of the post went.
We wrote a letter saying that we no longer wanted a place as dd was very settled where she is. She isn't 2 for another 5 months so we thought that would be plenty of notice.
They have got back to me saying they will be charging me 3 months fees. I've had no correspondence until this. I'm a little shocked but feel in a difficult position as I work there too. Really don't want to be spending out two sets of nursery fees.

did you keep a copy of the initial application?

it may have in the small print something along the lines of application being a contract?

I would ask them to provide you with a copy of the T&Cs that highlight this fee

Have a search on here as I remember a previous thread that talked about such charges being deemed unreasonable if they subsequently give your DD's place to someone else as they have not been disadvantaged by your giving notice. Do you know if the nursery is currently full with a waiting list? Also find out what the normal notice period is? If it is less than three months, then it is also unreasonable on that basis.

We decided against sending our DD to a nursery after I saw some things I wasn't happy with. They tried to keep both our deposit and our first month's payment...many arguments later they finally got it, that as far as we were concerned the deposit was there to cover the nursery in cases such as ours, so there was no need for them to also keep the first month fees, as they then gave the place to another child anyway. Don't accept that, Keep contacting them in writing until you get the response you want.

Look on the "Kids Unlimited..." thread. (a couple of days ago)