Nursery Fees

[justamum98]

Hi all,

we are due to receive our 15hrs free funding in September 2024 when our son is 2,5yrs old. I understand it is calculated over 38 weeks but I wondered why? If nurseries are open all year round and lets face it, we ideally want our kids to attend all year round, its not like we get 6 weeks off work in the summer too.

I am considering singing my child up full time but only during term time just because it is so much cheaper and I work from home anyways but what does everyone do once their kids go off to reception and above during summer holidays? I of course cannot take 6 weeks off work but could take 3 weeks off and my partner can take 3 weeks off too but then we have no holidays left for the rest of the year. We have no family around, it's just us but what does everyone do?

thanks in advance, any info would be appreciated xx

It's 38 weeks because that's school term time, same as school funding.
Your nursery might offer to stretch the funding eg 11 hours all year round.
Most people with school age children use childcare to cover holidays - childminders and holiday clubs.

I've long thought that the statutory entitlement to paid holiday should be exactly the same as the state school holiday duration. The gap makes no sense at all.

This is where the government fails. They want women to go back to work but only over funding for 38wks. There are very few term time only jobs.

My nursery offers the funding stretched so from September my LO will get 11hrs funded as we are stretching it across the year

Nurseries often stretch the funding to cover the full year. As for school holidays, lots use holiday clubs, you can still use tax free childcare for these.

We're doing a mix of holiday club, whole days holiday, half days holiday where I work from home around kids, and a couple of grandparent visits but they live over an hour away so not a great option.

And yes, you stretch the 15 hours term time to 11 hours for 50 weeks.

It’s because “historically” the funding was to mimic free pre school education (as a child I went to nursery school aged 3 9-12 5 days a week, and then onto the infant school on the same site)

So initially it was exactly that - 15h a week for 3-4 year olds in term time, meaning that child care providers had to cover the educational piece if they wanted their customers to get those free hours.

Then the scheme expanded from that basis to cover more hours, younger age groups etc - but still on the “school year” basis.

In relation to school holidays, another thing a lot of people do is to work part time - which obviously means a lower salary and less leave allowance but it also means there are one or two days a week in school holidays that you don’t have to cover. I work three days per week so we have two days holiday care each week.

We are lucky as we have some family help for a couple of the weeks and are filling the rest with annual leave and childminder. Next year we’ll aim to use a holiday club for at least one week.

With older children, some people work from home with the kids in the house but needs to be feasible based on your employer’s rules and attitude and the temperament of your kids…

Good luck in finding the nursery that offers term time only sign up. These are few and far between because most business models can not support absences like this. Most tend to have full yesr places but stretch the 15 weeks over the full year reducing the weekly number of hours. You may also need to be paying for additional items too that you haven't even factored in yet because of the subsidised place.

That's bonkers.
Most people who work don't have childcare responsibilities or particularly dependent school age children.

Say I work from 25 (or younger) to 65 - (or older) that's a 40 year work life, for which I'll need to be available for my (NT, able bodied) school age children during school holidays for 15 years. So, you're suggesting that for 25 years I should have 13 weeks leave (rather than 5 or 6) that I don't really "need"?

Parents are entitled to up to 4 weeks unpaid parental leave per child per year until they are 18. Per child, per parent. That's actually quite a lot of time, albeit unpaid. I recognise that this is not necessarily possible for many people.

Yes, it makes no sense given that politicians will often state that the purpose is to help parents (mainly mothers) back to work.

Our nursery will stretch the funding over the year, so fewer free hours a week, but it's every week.

Our nursery actually offers either full time all year or full time term time so it’s cheaper. It’s an option but I’m not sure it’s the best option for us.

It sounds like term time only would be a silly option for you if you work year round. Yes, you’ll have this issue once your kid starts school but a) why would you give yourself this headache 2 years early when you don’t have to, and b) once they’re school age there are holiday clubs which will take them. Most of these will not take under 4/5s. The term time offer is there for people like teachers, who don’t need holiday childcare, or those who have a SAHP who just use the free hours for education.

Term time only is a common option at our nursery, the place seems so much quieter during the holidays. It's also when staff are encouraged to take holiday.
These places are also there for parents who already have an older child that will be off for the school holidays, since they have to make arrangements for one, you might as well keep them together.