30 hours funded/free childcare

[USaYwHatNow]

Hi all, looking for advice around the funded childcare. I've done a fair bit of my own research and have searched the threads but struggling to understand in plain English 😂

My son is 4months old and will (hopefully) be attending my work's on site nursery later this year.

Even with the tax free childcare account it'll be a bit of a stretch, but willing to make sacrifices as its a lovely setting, convenient etc. and will mean due to less travel time I can condense my hours to work/rely on family so he will be in formal childcare for 30hrs a week.

My question is, if I put him into nursery for 30hrs,and get 30hrs funded, does that mean my invoice will essentially be £0? 😂 Apart from the daily sundries bill for his meals etc.

Just as a bit more context as not sure whether this is relevant, it's a nursery on an NHS site so no term time etc you literally pay for the hours you attend, although we pay the same amount even if we go on a family holiday for example, as a retainer-but they refund us meal payments/trips/extra activities paid for.

Thanks!

It’s worth noting that it doesn’t start until the term after they turn 3 which can be a real pain depending on when they were born. I moved my older DS nursery while he was receiving the 30 hours funding, for one we were still paying some ad for the other it cost us nothing but lunch. It depends how your nursery have structured their fees.

You don't get 30 hours funded until the term after the child turns 3 years old.

You can claim tax free childcare which is where the government pay 20% of your bill.

Firstly I assume you know 30 hours starts the term after they are 3? I'm guessing you do, but not clear from your post.

Secondly sadly it is not always that simple. In some cases, yes your invoice is £0. My DS is at a school nursery so they don't charge anything. Most settings don't get enough funding so they have to make up the money in other ways. This might mean you can only use funded hours at certain times or there are larger charges for other things. You would need to clarify with the nursery but it can be hard to get the specific information on what your bill will be.

Also 30 hours is term time only. If you work all year, it averages out at about 22 hours a week.

You don't get 30 hours until they are 3

And no you'll have to pay for food etc and they might have set times you can use them

You might get 15 but I'm not sure of the rules on that

The funded hours start the term after they’re 3, so for a June/July baby this would be august. For a September baby it would be January.
The funded hours only apply to term time, so the weeks outside of that you’d need to pay the full fee. The best thing is to talk to the nursery as they all have their own way of doing it. For example, we get 15 hours free, but the nursery stretch the funding to cover all year so we get 11.25 hours free each week, then pay an hourly or daily fee for the hours/full days on top of that.

The 30 hours in most cases will need a top up as the nurseries don't get the full day fee from the government, it's called at £3.50 per hour or something silly like that. When we used 30 free hours the monthly bill was still around £270.

Between the various limitations, sundries and the fact it's a full time provision, my childcare bill has gone from £1500 to £600-ish, so definitely not necessarily down to zero!

One big issue for me is that even if you don't attend full time (my lo does 4 days) the free hours are divided across 5 days, so I can only claim 4/5 of the free hours per week,even though her attendance is way over 30 hours altogether,if that makes sense.

With my childs 30 hours funded i still pay around £260 a month

My three year old gets 30 hours term time. However, he goes 3 days all year round which is roughly 21 hours per week, and is never there more than 7 hours a day.... but the nursery opens at 7am and closes at 6pm so still have to pay for those extra hours as it's a daily place not by the hour. It's a massive con really. Even with tax free childcare it works out at about £300 per month.

Sorry should have said I'm aware re the funding starting at 3yrs old-just trying to work out what would be best in the long run ☺️

Also he's a 31st August baby

Most nurseries around here don’t accept the full 30 hours as it’s not enough to cover their costs, so I’d say by the time we also paid sundries we saved about a third on our bill when the funded hours came into play.

It’s not free usually no.

The 30hrs is term time only, usually 22 a week stretched over 52 weeks and they can charge for consumables and food on top. It has reduced our bill by 35% (DD does 4 long days up to 42hrs-in reality she is usually in for 38 but we pay for 7.30-6 x4 days).

Some of the preschools here can be completely free for 30hrs but they are term time only and you provide all food etc and they are open school hours only. So no use to us.

The 30 hours free thing is only really to get kids in a pre school setting imho. eg. Our local pre school offers 30 hours free from the academic year before reception, (and 15 hours from the term after they're 3) plus it has amazing wraparound care that you pay extra before (just like when they're in primary school). Another option for when you're there is to find a childminder who is ofsted registered and they can be a bit more flexible with how they let you "spend"'your hours?

Charity pre-schools or state/school nurseries usually offer the 30 hours free or almost free, most private settings will have some form of top up charge.

Other than what's been said above, be aware that the 'extras' can be almost as much as the full fee price.
My DD starts next month but her 30yrs don't start until after Easter. Once they start, there's £10 a day for sundries, £10 a day for snacks, 'enrichment' fees etc etc and all added up, it's not far off the full cost of a day without any free hours.

My baby will be starting at the same time so it's going to be incredibly expensive.

Typo - 30hrs obviously 😄

I found this a total headache when it came do dd1 and funding. She goes to school nursery full time Monday-Friday, this is in her 30 free hours and we only pay for her lunches. If she was to stay in private nursery, the session times are longer so we would have to pay - we would also have to pay if we wanted to split the hours because, again, the session times are different. It might be best ringing a local nursery you're thinking about sending dc to and asking them how it would work

It totally depends on your nursery.

I'm very lucky we don't pay any extras so once he got the hours my bill is £0.

My friends nursery in the next town to us charges £10/15 a day on top

No-where near £0. I’m still paying close to £50 a day for a funded day with 6 ‘free’ hours. £80 is full day rate so it is discounted but nothing like free.

As others have said if your nursery is all year round they will spread the funding- approx 22 hours a week. Most nurseries now charge for consumables, they can't afford not to. This is likely to be between £5 and £10 a day. One charges £15 in my area! So you may be paying for 8 additional hours plus the consumables charge

Hi everyone , are there any nurseries that accept the 30 hours free childcare? I’m trying to find some but can’t seem to find any in Fulham.

Your best emailing the nurseries themselves.

There will deffo be ones that do it