Costs 1yr old

[chlo299]

Hi All,
I am due in April this year and I am already trying to budget for the nursery when my DD will be 12months. Could anyone who already has their baby in a nursery with the free hours and tax free childcare benefit tell me how much you pay a week after the free hours and tax free discount is applied as well as your nursery fee before those benefits? I cannot get my head around it and work it out myself so I'm hoping you could talk me through your experience x thanks ❤️

Hi there. My daughter turned 1 this week. The free hours entitlement hasn't started yet, some older babies will get it from April 2024. My daughter will get 25 hours from September 2024.

I am in Manchester. Our nursery is £53 a day. She attends four days per week, at a cost of £890 a month. With the tax free childcare, this works out at £730 a month.

When she gets the 15 hours from September, our nursery spreads these out over the year (as the funding is only for term time 38 weeks a year. This equates to one nursery day a week, so for her to go full time, we'll be paying the same as above, but we'll need to pay for her food at £7 a day, so approx £760 a month.

When she gets 30 hours from 2025, we'll need to pay for three days a week, plus food for two days a week. This is what we were doing for my son before he started school last term. It was £735 a month full price, £588 a month with the tax free childcare.

I’m in greater London and my son’s nursery is attached to a school. His nursery was £7/hour when he was under 2 and £6/hour when he was under 3 (they have higher child:adult ratios in the 2–3yo room). We had to send them in with a packed lunch or pay for a hot meal and provide nappies/suncream/etc. but the nursery provided snacks.

Now he is entitled to the 3yo 30 hours funded he is in the preschool room and I don’t have to pay anything except for hot meals (or provide a packed lunch as before), but the teachers do ask us to bring in fruit if we’re able. I believe we don’t have to pay a subsidy as his nursery is a part of a school, but I know that many other nurseries do add charges as the funding they get doesn’t cover overheads.

you'd be better off calling round your local settings, we are in the NE so our prices here will be vastly different to those in London for example. Our local nursery is £60 per day, Ds was in 5 days, 51 weeks of the year - so £1275 per month as it was £300 X 51 / 12. but another local nursery charges by the week.

I will be looking to send my DD 3 times a week at £72 per day so over a month it would work out at around £864 and by that time she would qualify for her 15free hours, would you be able to work it out roughly? Thanks for all the comments as well x

You would be best asking a few local nurseries for their fees, as they will likely all work it out differently and some may not be doing the free hours. If you need specific days you should also check how far in advance they need you to sign up, as they can have very long waiting lists.

@SnapdragonToadflax I know all the fees just can't work out the discount element from the free hours and tax discount perspective. It's £864 a month for both nurseries I looked at.

No one knows the discount yet as they don't know how much the subsidy will be. Plus increases in utilities, minimum wage etc will mean the base cost will rise.

Ah ok makes sense thanks x

Each nursery can apply the funded hours differently so do ask them.

For example mine do stretch over the year and for each fully funded day there is a consumables charge. Others may not stretch the hours, only allow funded hours to be used for certain sessions etc

Tax free is 20% off worth up to £500 per quarter

Also assume an increase in fees over the next year. Mine have been about 5% year on year

Ahh I see. In that case I don't know if anyone will be able to help you yet, as the free hours haven't started yet so no-one will have their bill.

Also, bear in mind there will very likely be an election before your baby starts nursery, and things could change with the free hours. Plus the nurseries might change their fees in the meantime. I would just assume £864 as a base amount for budgeting, and any money you get off that is a bonus.

Budget £1000 for now. That will hopefully be too much.

£72 a day, three days a week, 51 weeks a year is £11016 (most nurseries close for one week at Christmas, hence 51).

Divide by 12, that's £918 a month.

Under the current scheme (for example, if we have a change of government and the 15 hours doesn't go ahead), that works out at:

(918*3)-500 = £2254 per quarter
£751.33 per month

The reason I calculate this way is because you only get £500 tax free per quarter (this is the 20% reduction).

Taking a wild guess at 15 hours a week equating to one day, and paying £7 per day for food like I do, then that works out at:

(72*2)+7= £151 per week
£7701 per year
£641.75 per month, full price
£513.40 per month with tax free childcare.

@PassMeTheCookies amazing thank you so much ❤️❤️❤️

Everywhere is vastly different so you’d be better off doing your research into local nurseries and their fees. Also worth bearing in mind that nurseries can and do increase fees. However, as an idea, my DS is 20 months but his fees haven’t changed since he was 1. He’s always gone full time, 8-6pm 5 days a week. Some days he isn’t dropped off until 8:30/9 and we do try to pick him up earlier about 5:30. But we still pay the same as if he did 8-6 as it’s a day rate. Our nursery charges £70 a day (when we signed him up it was £55 to give an idea of how much his fees have risen). This includes all meals and snacks, nappies, wipes and milk (cows milk not formula).

Our last full bill (Nov as Dec we had a week taken off as nursery was closed) was £1531 (this is rounded to nearest £). Using tax free childcare that took it to around £1224. It’s worth noting that the amount you get through tax free childcare is capped at £500 per quarter. So if you have high fees, like we do, then the final month in the quarter we don’t get any tax free childcare as we’ve used up our allowance in months 1&2. We didn’t know this and it was a nasty shock when we got our bill and tfc didn’t top us up!

We don’t qualify for any funded hours yet, DS is 2 in May so we’ll get the new 15 funded hours from Sept. Our nursery will charge a fee of £15 on the day(s) we use our funded hours. This is because the funded hours just cover the actual childcare costs and not extras like snacks, wipes etc. Most nurseries will do this although the amount varies.