Fee paying children - am I a pushover?

[misshardbroom]

I work in a community preschool where most of our children are using their government funded place.

However, there are always a number of children who are self-funded for whatever reason, e.g. they are 3 but not yet eligible for funding, or they're using their funded provision elsewhere. So these children get a bill at the start of each half term.

Currently, we give them about 3 or 4 weeks to pay it, with the option to pay in 2 instalments. It's always a bit of a nightmare because of late / non payment, and in a short half term like this one, it can be the holidays again before I've got all the fees in.

I'm beginning to think that we're being too lenient, and that we should bill parents in Week 1, and give them a week to pay it in full. But I don't know what other preschools do. Please note, it's a community / charity preschool rather than a private day nursery.

What do you do?

we get billed before term starts
fees are due the first day of term
if you go more than a week late they start charging interest

The trouble is, those bills are a killer before the funding kicks in. Can't you bill them before the holidays, and give them the option of (1) paying in full; (2) paying in 2 installments; (c) paying monthly

DD gets the NEG now but was self funded for a few months first, and we also pay for an extra session a week at the moment.

I just pay cash for that week when it's due, ocassionally pay a week ahead or 2 weeks in arrears, depending on the cash I have on me. I would have no objection to paying ahead, say half a term at a time, but a lot of the parents at our nursery would struggle to pay upfront TBH.

2 installments, up to a fortnight to pay each one sounds very fair, the question is how to enforce it for the non payers? And to change it now when there is already an agreement might be tricky, as you already have a contract with the parents and cannot change the terms without agreement IIRC.

My nursery do not charge interest AFAIK but they do threaten not to allow siblings to come to preschool if fees are not paid

We are also a community, charity run pre-school. We bill monthly in advance. We do not charge interest - although that is an interesting (no pun intended) idea that I may discuss with our committee. If the bill is not paid within 2 weeks then we "reserve the right not accept the child until all arrears are paid"

Paying up front is essential to avoid the bad debt that can easily & quickly mount up with payment in arrears. Moaningminnie it sounds like you have a very understanding pre-school - many could not afford to run like this.

I think that half termly bills can be steep for parents (although of course they should have taken this into account when accepting a place), this is why we bill monthly.

It is in a fairly deprived area/lot of low income families so I think that is part of it. I didn't know it was so casual until after she started, I was expecting a direct debit thing, probably a month ahead!

They do regularly ask on newsletters for parents to pay up so they can buy materials etc, it is also a community preschool. I have posted about it before, I only pay £7 for a three hour session when self funding. I don't know how they do it TBH.

I think the usual is either in advance in full (fees due on 1st day of term) or monthly in advance.

At ours the fees are paid weekly. It makes it easier to flag any money owed before it builds up too much.

When I was a playgroup treasurer we used to get non-payers. The problem was they were always people I knew could well afford to pay. They were just lazy, and didn't realise how strapped for cash the playgroup was.

when my older 2 were at playgroup before the funding, invoice for following term was handed out last day of term. expected that would pay for the half term up front- most did. Those that found it hard paid weekly. It worked well.

I think that's one of the things that frustrates me the most - the non-payment doesn't seem to bear any correlation to the (apparent) financial position of the family. I have a little Polish girl whose parents don't speak English and who lives in the toughest council estate in town, and they pay on the dot. I have another child from an area I can only dream of living in, and I have to chase for the money every time.

We have a late payment policy - it's in the Policies and Guidelines doc.

Our standard invoicing schedule is half a term in advance, invoices are sent out the first week of term, and payment is required before the half term. Most parents are within this.

There are some who are difficult, and for these we can offer weekly or even sessional payments. If they're not communicating with us, ignoring reminders etc we tend to have a discussion about why we think they're not paying, be it situation at home or forgetfulness. If the bill is mounting up and it doesn't look like we'll get the money then we'll ask the parent to stop bringing their child until the arrears are paid.

That said, we calculated the other day that a single child's full time NEG funding is worth over £2000 to the pre-school so we're trying to find ways we can retain the child when they're NEG funded.

We changed our payment policy a couple of years ago because of some serious non-payers. We now ask for payment half-termly in advance, although parents can pay weekly or monthly in advance if they'd prefer.

I strongly feel that this is the only way to be fair to the late-paying families, the preschool and the parents who do pay on time. Having a close friend who was 'allowed' to carry on not paying until the amount became quite large, I think it is actually kinder not to allow parents to run up big bills which then become very difficult to pay.

At my dd's playgroup we paid weekly in advance.

My dd2 went monday, tuesday, wednesday so on monday I paid for all 3 days.

Worked well, I think.

When ds started when he turned 3 but before his funded place started I used to get an invoice every month with a couple of weeks to pay it. You could pay in the bank or online or at the council offices. I chose to pay online as it was more convenient.