How to survive with the l maternity leave and how to return full time work after ML finished?

[Comfywomfy]

I am working full time currenty, located at Scotland. My maternity pay will be the fix amount of £152 or somewhere around this. My husband working at the same place, and we both don't earn that much tousands.. we got a mortgage too, last year we lost our previous jobs so now we not the best with savings. (Baby came unexpected) obviusly we couldn't be happier we'll be parents, but im just constatly worrying, because this maternity pay really not a lot... can i apply for maternity allowance too, even im full time worker just now? And my other concerns is about returning back to work too. Fair enough we only get 9 months i think that should be at least 2 years... but it is what it is. I just can't get the part, if i want to return my full time job i have to put my baby to private nursery wich means i earn money to pay off the nursery..but for a 9 months old baby i would be the best company.. our parents live very far so not an option they looking after the baby..:( also my husband working at the same place so we cant work in different shifts. Private nursery for ful time cost a fortune...what is my options? I cant find any information about this, if i catch anything thats only about when the baby turning two.. i heard about working 16 hours a week and the goverment tops up the wage but i cant find anything about this either..:( or is there any free nursery at 9 months? Sorry if im asking silly questions, but im really not familiar with these topic...

No you only get Maternity Allowance if you don't qualify for Statutory Maternity Pay.

You could see if there is a childminder for your baby rather than nursery. I dont know what financial help there is for childcare if you both work

Childminder is pretty much the same, would cost like 80%of my wage... in that case i would just stay with the baby, but if we need any remortgage or anything we won't get it because im not working..but if i do but i spend my nearly full wage on nursery or childminder...thats okay 🤷‍♀️

www.gov.uk/help-with-childcare-costs

You might get help towards costs. Have you checked if you'd be eligible.

Childcare wouldn't be paid just by you, it's a shared cost. You'd also get child benefit

Can you afford to get by on your husband’s wage alone? If so, you have the option of being a stay at home parent until your child is eligible for the free hours at nursery, at which point you could return to work.

16 hours was tax credits which no longer exist. Free nursery hours are age three as standard, two in certain cases, you would need to check if eligible but I think it's looked after children or if on income support benefits.

No unfortunately we can't do that (live only on my husband's wage) that only would cover the monthly cost (mortgage, bills, car ect...:( ) im very puzzled, really don't know how we gonna cope with this.. uk is really not a family friendly system. Some of the europian countries have maternity leave for years, for that point, when that's ends the child entitled for a free nursery..wish the same here

As above you can only claim maternity allowance when you aren't eligible for SSP, you can't claim both.

Unfortunately, child care is expensive and while it may seem like it's taking up a full wage, it is only for a couple of years before you're eligible for free nursery (I believe when the child is 3)

I'm not sure in terms of financial help for 2 full time parents.

To try and reduce days needed in nursery do you have any friends/other family that are closer that would maybe be willing to do a day or two for you?
Have you talked to your work about flexible working, perhaps you and your DH could do condensed hours so say stay longer one/two days and have an extra day off, if both of you could do this but on different days then there would be 4 days a week that you wouldn't need covered (that's assuming you work 5 days with 2 off normally). Obviously this depends on type of work/company etc but worth asking them if there's options

Childminder is usually a bit cheaper than private nursery. You should be able to pay for childminder or nursery tax free. Google tax free childcare care. So for every £100 of childcare cost, you pay £80 and the government pays £20. It adds up. I think there is a limit to how much you can get though over 12 months. You could look at moving jobs to work opposite shifts to your husband to help save on childcare costs depending on your career etc

Depending on salary you could apply for Universal Credit

No any family members around here, or even our friends live at other towns.. i know sounds really bad.. work, fix days with fix hours so we can't really swop the days around. :( but thanks for any advice, maybe we have to consider find a new job for me. Im only pregnant just now (due in end of april) , so it's a year from now when i have to return. i really hope what covid destroyed, it will be fixed then and won't be that hard find a new job. :( thanks again for the comments!

I think this is sensibly why people plan babies and save before they have them. You're obviously seeing that now, but of course, when you didn't expect to be pregnant it wouldn't have been something you thought about before. I don't know how Scotland differs, but I receive maternity allowance and 600 a month or so (give or take a bit with child benefit, which is 100 ish a month, I have 2 now). That is about the cost of nursery, so it was manageable for a year. We were just sensible about expenses, no Netflix, no fancy holidays, eating at home, cooking from scratch, no commuting costs (which was nice!). We saved up a bit to have a buffer during that year.

Then going back to work, yes, it's expensive to pay for childcare. With my eldest, I think there was 200 left over each month from my contribution after nursery. But it was worth it, putting those years in meant I progressed in my career and 8 years later, I'm earning significantly more (and no childcare expenses now). It's easy when they are little because childcare is full days, it's when they get to school age that it gets trickier (though less expensive). If you can build in working flexibly early on, it will be beneficial later. We have no family help either, so it's always just been us and we've balanced it all between the two of us. Depending on your income, you may be entitled to additional benefits too so may be worth looking into.

You get tax free childcare if you qualify (both working a certain amount), which means you only pay 80% of childcare costs and gov't tops up the rest. This is from birth to 12 years. You get 30 funded hours a week from age 3 (or 2 if on certain means tested benefits). So the really expensive time for childcare is only 1-3 (or 2), so it's short lived, but yes, does take some planning.