"15 hours free entitlement" and private prep-school fees

[Alanalan20]

Can you help i'm trying to work out how much I would pay for school fees for our 4 year old. the pre-prep fees are £7,362.00 for a year. The school web site states that 3-4year olds are entitled to get 15 hours free and then they pay the remainder.

Anyone know roughly how much the saving will be. I've asked the school but they've not come back to me yet.

It will vary slightly depending on which council you are in, but currently it is around £1710 per annum or £570 per term. Alas there is a cap applied to the rate for those 15 hours, so you don't get full benefit of it.

We got about £530 per term , 5 years ago , so LM's calculation sounds about right.

Establishments are not allowed to charge top up fees on the "free hours" so a cap would not be relevant, they either accept them in full payment or they don't.

Vouchers are for children who are "pre" school though. I have never before heard of them funding school places.

They can fund actual school fees. Each child gets 6 terms - the terms spanning 2 years when they are aged either 3 or 4. So an August born child could get 3 terms of reception discounted by this method (know someone who did exactly this last year). I think £500-£600 a term roughly.

It is deemed an Early Years setting like any other private preschool or nursery. As long as the preprep meets LA criteria (ie.open so many weeks per year and hours per week and Ofsted-ed) it can qualify.

Just to clarify the plan is to move my daughter from nursery to private pre-school (assuming we can afford it). But based on the responses I've had it looks like private school (5 days a week 9am to 3.30pm) will cost us around £100 a month more than the current nursery fees (2days a week 8am to 6pm).

Considering she'll be learning a lot more I think it's a "go".

Ok so that accepted our area is very specific on 2 things:

The free hours are free - the establishment cannot ask for top up fees for these hours.
Parents must be able to access the free hours only and not be expected to pay for additional hours (additional hours can be offered but cannot be compulsory). I am really struggling to see how a school could meet these criteria?

At last the school have just emailed me.

The school fees are £7,362.00
Based on my daughters date of birth the free amount will be £1,400

Amount to pay is £5,963.40

Maybe not many in your area do meet those criteria but since we are talking about under 5's it is possible that the morning session, for example is only 3 hours long, and even a Reception-age child could attend just those 5 morning sessions (if probably unusual in practice) and certainly a preschooler.

"Parents must be able to access the free hours only". Well if that is a universal requirement, then agree that it would appear incompatible with most private nurseries and private schools, but absolutely standard practice to have the Early Years Funding knocked off the school fees until the term that the child turns 5. So for many children this goes into the reception year.

Many independent schools let you use the early years vouchers up to the term the child turns 5y - so can beused for part of reception year too.

Ive never been in the position as all 3 of mine are autumn babies. But the clause mentioned by Looney about not forcing parents to pay for extra hours isn't the case in all LAs. There are quite a few private nurseries around here which will accept the vouchers but still state children must attend for a minimum of 20hours or 25hours.

Also, are the 15hours term time only or across the whole year? I'm curious as to whether you could use somewhere else during the summer if your establishment was only term-time. And if the hours are only term-time then pro-rata that and it sure works out at far less each week than 15hours?

I believe the 15 hours is term time only.

Round here - Sheffield - not all private nurseries offer term time contracts. they can be very hard to get.

Agree term-time only, up to a maximum of 39 weeks. soem LA's are more flexible and allow it to be spread over the entire year and soem nurseies deduct it across the 12 monthly payments not those correpsonding to term-time weeks.

So, do day nurseries pro-rata the 15hours? So 15hours for 38wks spread across the year equates to about 10 or 11 free hours a week. So most people using a day nursery to allow them to work will be getting 10 or 11 free hours a week rather than 15. Have I got that right?

And is it the term after they turn 5? So DD2 who is about to start Reception at independent school the 2nd week of Sept who turns 5 in Oct, can I claim 15hours a week for her until Christmas?

Depends how you look at it, swings and roundabouts. Effectively they still get the 15 hours for the relevant weeks but overpay so that they don't get a larger bill in the holidays. Some nurseries deduct the 15 hours for the relevant weeks as they occur and bill accordingly.

We claimed for whole of Reception , ie. until dd had turned 5 in August, so yes you'd qualify until Christmas. The Bursar should give you the form at start of term.

Thanks for that, LIZS, really helpful. Wish I'd thought of it for DS and DD1 as it would have paid for uniform and school dinners if nothing else!

Yes term until after they turn 5y. DD's birthday is April and we recieved a discount for recpetion for the first two terms.

Also it depends on your individual schools. Independent schools, like other early year providers, have to be registered to be able to accept the early year vouchers.

DD has just finished reception in a private school.

She qualified for 15 hours free until end of term she turned 5. DD is a Jan baby so got funding until Easter.

The school took the funded sum off the invoice so we paid the same sum monthly - saved me approx £100 a month (two terms worth of funding approx £1100).

The school has a nursery that accepts funded places.

The school also accepted the salary sacrifice childcare vouchers - compushare as full payment of her fees until the end of the term she turned 5.

The LA did have a try on at the start of term and tried to say DD's class were not eligible. I wrote a letter and they did an immediate about turn.

Same applies for children choosing to delay reception entry - they can still have a funded pre school pace until compulsory school age ie term after 5.

There is no distinction between reception and pre school in the funding guidelines - the funding is for Early years foundation stage - which both pre school and reception covers.

We pro rata our pre reception fees so that parents can see the cost of a morning, 2 mornings, one full day, one morning, two afternoons etc etc. The 15 hours free is basically three mornings for us so the parents see a 'bursary' equivalent to the full three mornings. We charge for everything over the three mornings on the pro rata basis. The grant is applicable up to and including the term in which the child becomes five. Bad luck all those whose little angel's birthday is right at the end of a holiday!

With the salary sacrifice childcare vouchers this can be used for 'qualifying childcare' - i.e. fees (of any kind - school, nursery etc) up to the legal schooling age and then for after school club (not that we charge), holiday activities etc.