Full time nursery - how much?

[rach971]

If your child goes to nursery 5 days a week, year round, how much do you pay please? I know the funding only covers term time and I know fees vary wildly by nursery and area but just looking to guage how much I could be looking at paying per month

Thank you

Nurseries here (midlands) are between £300 and £500 per week, without funding.

As comparison, I am a cm and it would be roughly £920/month, 5 days x10 hours including food and nappies, using 30 hours of funding.

I charge £71 day without funding.

I do take holiday though that i don't charge for so it would be less that that depending on any annual leave.

In Scotland, we're currently £75 a day without funding.

We are Kent - approximately £1200 per month. We spread the funding out for the whole year so equivalent to around 22hrs per week (2 days roughly), then each additional day is £400 per month.

The £1200 is with funding?

My nursery is £81 a day (north Yorkshire) They charge £1.50/£2.50 an hour in consumables on funded days. I do not have to provide anything other than changes of clothes. I stretch out the funding so get two days a week. The problem with asking about the cost of nursery is how long is a piece of string - it varies so much.

I did join a call to listen to the implementation of the 30 funded hours and did ask why the funding is for only 38wks (if that is the right number of weeks) and not 52 but was never given an answer. Kept correcting them when they called it free childcare and did ask if they had a risk associated with nurseries putting up their fees because of the funding but was fobbed off.

Yep 😬

Using 30 hours a week funding it would be roughly £800 a month full time in term time or about £1080 a month if that was on 22 hour a week stretched funding all year.

With the first figure you’d be paying full private fee in the holidays if you needed care out of term time. The amount of funding you get stays the same whether it is term time or stretched, it’s just used differently. If you earn too much for funded hours you’d still get 15 hours the term after their 3rd birthday.

The system needs a complete overhaul as it was introduced for three year olds getting ready for school not as childcare as it is used and needed now.

It would make much more sense for whole year funding as most jobs carry on all year. Stretched funding does try to address it but obviously the amount doesn’t come close to the actual fees of full time care. It would be easier for everyone if parents got the funding amount directly and nurseries could just charge the fees they need to cover costs.

I know that we are lucky in this country because we get the funded hours and the tax free element but still stings every month (it also doesn’t help that you do not want to pay peanuts because you get monkeys but still)

Full time - 50 hours per week
Non-funded : £325 a week
Funded (22 hours all year round) : £197 a week

Yeah mine last year was 1,400 a month (that's with the funded hours) south east. It was really hard although long term much better financially. Will depend on the nursery though x

Childminders are generally cheaper. If you stretch funding its around 21 hours funded a week, (depending on how many weeks the setting shuts); so anything over 21 hours would be at the normal hourly rate. Settings can ask for payments for food, extra lessons but they must be voluntary and you could opt to provide your own.

The costs can vary so much by area and setting, but this is exactly the kind of thing that catches families out because the funding often only covers part of the picture. Childcare is such a big pressure point for lots of parents. Sencillo’s whitepaper, The True Cost of Education 2026, is useful on that wider cost journey if helpful: https://www.sencillo.finance/join-us-download-whitepaper

Our average chain nursery in the north west of England would be £1894 without funding and £1198 with.

We have each gone down to four days so our daughter only goes three days and that is £447 per month. We are only slightly worse off after accounting for income tax, NICs, student loan contributions being reduced and less commuting and we get a day each with her.

My nursery charges £58 per day in the north west, no extra charge for consumables. 30hrs funding covers two days over 51 weeks, so full time with funding would be around £740 per month, or £592 with tax free childcare.
Without 30hrs free it would be £1230, or £986 after tax free childcare.

I’m actually 4 days a week - which before funding was £1150 per month, for 48 weeks of the year.
got funding now which stretch covers 2.5 days a week so now we pay for 1.5 days a week and it costs about £460 each with the tax free childcare.

mum in Scotland

Almost £3k a month. No funding in London.