Pre-school fees, not negotiable

[Ripeberry]

Hi,just wondering what everyone else does at their pre-school?
Our Treasurer has had some payments in (some almost 1 month late) and the parents have actually re-calculated the payments and taken money OFF for days that their child did not attend or if the child was ill!
It was my understanding that pre-school fees are NON-NEGOTIABLE and they have to pay the full term even if their child does not attend.
What does your Treasurer or Committee do?

they've taken it upon themselves to take money off????

at ours fees are paid in advance and you don't get money back if the child is ill.
how bizarre. think you might need to be a bi more strict!

Yes, they are a strange bunch. The fees are meant to be paid in advance but they just take SO long to pay up!
They just think they can threaten us with leaving and going to the pre-school down the road, as if we should be gratefull that they darken our doorway.
Maybe we should put a clause in about paying £5 xtra for each week we DON'T receive the payments in time!
That should sort them
Also, i'm a bit fed up that i've paid about £40 of my own money for pre-school gifts and party stuff and i'm not going to be repaid as we don't have enough for the wages. Grrr!

I had this for the first time today.

Up until now I'd have said the fees would always be due, even if the child had been off ill / on holiday / whatever. I'm sure it must say that in your preschool brochure / leaflet thing.

In my case, the child is a new joiner who didn't come for the first ??? sessions (no one is quite sure how many she missed as we never had a fixed start date for her). I can't really see how we can charge for sessions she didn't attend when she's not started yet IYSWIM. It's not as though we've got a waiting list, so the child isn't stopping someone else coming.

Anyway, in a normal situation I'd say fees are still due if the child misses a session. Need to get firm and explain that to the parents. Good luck

absoltuely, we get charged 5% extra for late payments!

Our preschool has this problem, it used to let parents not pay for the days they didn't use due to sickness, but has moved to asking for payment in advance, and no reduction for days not used. But parents still pay late.

The committee makes rules that parents have to pay, and if they are consistently late their child will be excluded from preschool. In practice they find it hard to enforce and one or two parents are getting away with underpaying.

The preschool is in credit so it doesn't mean wages won't get paid.

Our pre-school is moving to requesting fees by the end of the previous term. £15 for late payment.

Personally I think it's outrageous that people should think they don't need to pay if their child is sick. Do they think that their teachers shouldn't be paid? I imagine this is even more of an issue if the place is non-funded.

We've had similar. Had to explain that the fee is for the place, not the session. It says in the T&Cs that all sessions will be billed, but people either don't seem to read that or they just chose to ignore that.

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Our invoices state that fees are payable in the event of illness, and a deadline is given for payment of 2 weeks after invoice. Our preschool has taken a set of parents to small claims court before, so is quite strict!

However, billing only starts once the child has arrived, so if they start mid-term then they only get invoiced for sessions from then on.

Ours charge an extra 5% if not paid on time and if persistently late will exclude child unless good reason given. We have to pay a month in advance and again don't get money back if ill.

We put into force a completely new contract.

It covers thing like emergency closure of pre-school for flooding or something. Only after 2 weeks would they get a refund of any sessions after the intial 2 weeks.

We give them their invoices much earlier than previousl - in July for September!!! 10% late fee if not paid in the first week (they are due the first session of term), 5 % compound for the next 2 weeks and then they loose their place.

If their has been an agreement to pay in weekly installments we set how many weeks they have and I give them a slip for each week, again if they are late for one week we start charging interest. They are also warned if they do not pay they will not be offered installments again.

We also ask for a terms notice in writing if they wish to leave.

In all these situations we can/will waive in genuine circumstances but we had several bad debts one year, why should everyone else subsidise non-payers.

Ours is half price for the week if they are off for all 3 sessions. If they attend 1 of 3 sessions we have to pay for the whole week still.

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We charge for a child's place so they have to pay if off sick or on holiday. If they are off on holiday for an extended period the have to give us 2 weeks notice in writing and we charge in full for 2 weeks and 50% after that. We send out invoices the 2nd week of term and if they are not paid within a set time we charge a £10 fee, after that it goes to court.
This is all set out in our prospectus which parents sign when they apply for a place.

Personally I think the pre-schools mentioned that give discounts for absence need to think again. If they have less costs when children are absent then it's reasonable but I would have thought 99% of the costs are fixed and giving discounts must play havoc when setting budgets.