Tips for having long maternity with low money?

[mum2be99]

Hello all,

I'm early on in pregnancy but there's no harm in financial planning early!

So I'll be on Statutory Maternity Pay which is barely gonna cover anything tbh. I'm the highest earner and luckily I can save around 500-700 per month while being frugal (no current kids, no car, not much of a consumer!) But I'm sure a lot of this may go to the big expenses coming with a baby as well as unexpected big expenses we have to prep for

Our monthly outgoings are over 1000 so I'm concerned I won't get much a of a maternity leave and be forced to go back to work, but other people do seem to make it work. I don't want to sit down and do the proper numbers until I'm 3 months into the pregnancy because I don't want to stress myself out even more now

My work do offer a great maternity pay scheme but only when you've been there a year, and I haven't! 🙄

So any tips would be welcome. People do seem to make it work so I'm hoping my savings cover it if we have a frugal next 8 months..

You definitely can’t work from home with a baby or child if you have to work a set amount of hours or meetings etc.

I’m self employed, dh also, so we are both home with almost 2 year old. I really cannot get anything done whilst Ds is around. I do very minimal hours now ( around 10 per week), and do almost all when dh is free ( he works 4 days).
Ds will start nursery in the Autumn

Everything can be secondhand except cot mattresses and car seats. I got a lovely oak cot bed for £30, for example.

Look into the tax free childcare scheme - saves you about 20% as you get a government top up. Then you get 30 free hours from 3 years (term time; less when spread over the whole year).

I'm hoping to go back 4 days a week as by the time you account for tax etc my 5th day take home barely covers the extra nursery cost for the extra day (use the take home salary calculator to see the difference for you).

I really don't think you can WFH with a baby / toddler - having with friends with kids that age, they need a lot of supervision/entertainment. Unless you work for yourself or have fully flexible hours, but then you'll probably end up working once they are in bed (if they sleep...!). I work from home, mostly fiddling with spreadsheets and preparing reports, & don't think I'd be able to do it (it was bad enough with a puppy!).

WFH and looking after a baby is impossible. It can be some help in an emergency or if your baby is ill but even that might not work and you might need time off. Come to it prepared, maternity leave will not be a holiday and childcare is a full time job in itself, during and after maternity leave.

You'll need proper reliable childcare for the hours that both yourself and your partner are working- it is just not possible to work to a decent level and look after a baby at the same time.

Both you and your partner could make formal flexible working requests to change your working hours to minimise the need for childcare. Eg if you both work full time but request to compress your hours into 4 days you will only need 3 days childcare per week not 5 - eg he works Monday- Thursdays and you work Tuesday- Friday so you only need childcare Tuesday-Thursday.

You write a lot about what you can do - Make sure your partner is also saving money and if necessary he could take on some overtime or a 2nd job if money is going to be tight when baby arrives.

This is a great idea @NaerDoWell - not sure if it would be possible with our employers but defo something worth keeping in mind

Assuming you are in the UK OP you can have up to ten keeping in touch days with your employer- try and use as many as you can if your employer is in agreement- as they are paid as a full days wages on top of anything you may be getting as maternity leave.
Obviously you'd need to arrange for childcare on these days so they might not be an option!

Any annual leave build up would need to be taken before the baby is born or after you have returned to work. I have arranged to officially 'return to work' two months before my first day back in the office, and these two months will be paid as annual leave. If you are off for a year you will get a full years annual leave plus bank holidays (so about a further 9 days), plus anything untaken at the time you went on maternity.

@Barleysugar85

Assuming you are in the UK OP you can have up to ten keeping in touch days with your employer- try and use as many as you can if your employer is in agreement- as they are paid as a full days wages on top of anything you may be getting as maternity leave. Obviously you'd need to arrange for childcare on these days so they might not be an option!

Any annual leave build up would need to be taken before the baby is born or after you have returned to work. I have arranged to officially 'return to work' two months before my first day back in the office, and these two months will be paid as annual leave. If you are off for a year you will get a full years annual leave plus bank holidays (so about a further 9 days), plus anything untaken at the time you went on maternity.

That’s not right. Your wages get topped up to full pay for the day - you can’t earn more on a KIT day than you would if you were at work.

So financially it’s best to do KIT days whilst in the nil pay weeks.

A normal year has 8 bank holidays in it. This year is different.

I also found myself in this position although we had just bought a house together (found out i was pregnant 6 weeks after moving in) i had already committed to having work done on the house and garden as well. I earn double what my partner does and i'll be honest i'm usually a good saver, but i've really struggled for the past few months. I did buy a lot of second hand stuff, but what i did find is that because i was paying in cash, it left me really out of pocket by the end of each month. Looking back i probably would be better off having used my credit card, but i can always use it when i'm on maternity leave and then pay it off when i return to work

Don't advise OP on accrued holidays and when to take them, this will clearly depend on her employer. She'll need to check her own policies and discuss the exact no of days and arrangements whe to take them when she tells them about the pregnancy. Some employers will accept carrying leave over/phased return combined with taking leave every week/block leave booking. It varies.

Also there is no legal requirement for KIT days to be paid as full pay days if you don't do a full day of work but eg you do part of the day. Ot also depends on the employer whether they are offset by them against maternity pay or paid on top of it so again she'll need to check her own policies.

I wouldn’t be planning to work from home with a baby with no set childcare-you can’t possibly do both at once.

You say twice in your OP that ‘other people seem to make it work’ but what exactly do you mean?

Yup-it’ll be fine, you’ll have a baby and when you’re back at work, you’ll pay for childcare and get your wages and things will be as tight or as easy as your bills allow. BUT, I would say that the people in know in your situation, where the woman is the higher earner, their maternity leave was short and they worked very long hours to make ends meet. The ones who had long maternity leaves had high earning husbands and few money worries.

How much maternity leave do you wan to take?

As well as buying stuff second hand think about selling bits as well. When ever DC grow out of clothes I sort through and out the nicer stuff on Vinted. Just offloaded a load of old IKEA furniture on FB as well. Not loads of money, but helping while I'm on mat leave and only takes a few mins to upload.

WRT annual leave/SPL it will vary by company but as an example I am taking all the paid time off (enhanced and statutory mat pay) then taking a block of accrued annual leave and DH a chunk of the unpaid weeks as shared parental leave. So I'll be getting paid once I am in my annual leave and we'll be on my higher salary while DH is on SPL.

@Lockdownmummy I thought you couldn't do that, that you can only still get 39 weeks paid between both parents even if taking SPL? Interesting if you can, I'll have to look into it!

@GinnyBee sorry might not have been clear. I took 39 weeks paid and DH's weeks were unpaid but I was back on my regular salary (which is higher than DH)

Aaah, I get it now! Yeah that makes sense.

Ok, I know it is your previous firstborn baby and you want everything perfect but honestly the baby will not know if you spend £600 or £100 on a transport system. You can get some real bargains on Facebook or eBay or car boot sales. Babies grow so quickly they only wear some outfits three or four times so you can save so much money which will equal more time you can spend home with baby. Also allow family to buy baby equipment rather than gifting money. I bought my first grandchild a cot, wardrobe, chest of drawers with baby change unit on as well an outfit and nappies. My dd started off buying everything new but then realised she could stay home longer if she switched to pre used clothes. Congratulations.

Although my work offer a decent enhanced maternity package, we’re still savings before the baby arrives.

I’ve worked out what I would get averaged over a full year and we’re saving the difference. This way means we’re covered for bills for a full year.

I would definitely recommend saving as soon as possible.

A new born baby needs very little (something to sleep in, nappies, clothes, buggy/car seat, sling, formula stuff unless you're BF?) and the shops are open after you baby is born, so you could save, but hold off buying the stuff you're not sure you'll need or that you may find won't suit you. I bought loads of stuff second hand (including car seat, though I'm not recommending this) and was given a lot of used items from friends.

I feel like my biggest mistake with my DD was buying things brand new, you can get them for a fraction of the price second hand. It was such an epic waste of money.

Not to be negative but unless your job is the most straightforward thing in the world there is absolutely no way you can work whilst looking after a child! Not fair on work, your colleagues or your child :(

Ask work to give you the enhanced pay anyway. Worst they can do is say no.

Completely agree @whatcangowrong

Yep I can always ask.

Get made redundant!