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Original poster

IF I GO BACK TO WORK TAX CREDITS WILL GIVE ME EXTRA £5 TO COVER CHILDCARE FOR 2 KIDS!!!!!

22 replies

sqwerty · 02/08/2006 10:43

Basically we are totally skint I have been a sahm for 3 years.
Every moth about a week after payday the money is all gone. We dont have any loans or finance or anything like that, just the mortgage, council tax bills etc there is nothing left! So we have decided i should get a job, i have just been offered a part time job which is a great job but when i rang the tax credits about childcare I would get only an extra £4.60 to cover child costs for 2 children, i get £37 weekly already but that generally go's or food or bills.
Basically if i go back to work i would have to spend over half of my wages on childcare costs as i have no body to care for my children.
this doesnt seem fair to me.

OP posts:

Northerner · 02/08/2006 10:45

That doesn't seem right to me. Maybe you have a high household income?

Original poster

sqwerty · 02/08/2006 10:58

No its 22 thousand a year

OP posts:

acnebride · 02/08/2006 11:01

I do feel sympathetic but i'm afraid my childcare cost is actually almost exactly half my income including tax credits.

Have you factored in childcare vouchers, assuming your employer will do them? That can be another 50 a month?

Roll on school, eh.

flutterbee · 02/08/2006 11:04

£22k is that just what you dh earns or what you will earn as a couple.

chocolatemummy · 02/08/2006 11:07

Its horrible isn't it, I have recently been made redundant, with both my dh and I working we only got £56 a month in tax credits to go towards almost £400 a month chld care costs. our joint annual income was about £35,ooo as I only worked part time. But now I am not working at all and we have lost £15,000 a year income and tax credits have actually been reduced! This is because we don't need to pay for child care if I am not working, well trouble is, I am still paying for it as I obviously need it to be able to get another job! the system is pretty worthless if you ask me

Bozza · 02/08/2006 11:08

I would have thought that was pretty normal. I know that I am on a reasonable salary and pay nearly half my pay in childcare and that is with one child in school. I don't get any help with childcare because our income is too high.

acnebride · 02/08/2006 11:09

also do you have a 3-year-old yet, i.e. have you got nursery vouchers?

I believe they're different things aren't they??? i mean the ones that pay for 2.5 hours of each day?

Try asking your employer if you can do any of the work in the evening/weekends when you don't have to apy for childcare?

flutterbee · 02/08/2006 11:09

when dh and I lost over 7k in earnings we were told it made no difference to our tax credits, makes no sence at all.

acnebride · 02/08/2006 11:09

sorry that assumes you both have 9-5 jobs. i guess i just mean, whenever one of you is not working.

Original poster

sqwerty · 02/08/2006 11:14

that does inculde my sons free 2.5 hrs per day.
my partner works shifts so different days each week

OP posts:

acnebride · 02/08/2006 11:26

ok my stupid suggestions have run out now...

i'm back to roll on school.

Bozza · 02/08/2006 11:33

Acutally because I only work 3 days a week I didn't see much difference between getting 2.5hrs * 5 in those 3 days and paying for before/after school. I couldn't change my hours because of DD being in nursery. I am looking forward to her getting grant in another year's time.

chocolatemummy · 02/08/2006 11:58

I think we just have to accept that unless we are on very good salaries we are going back to work either for our sanity or for essential extras because if i took my individual part time salary and knocked off the child care, tax and travel expenses, Even if you are an about £10 an hour you only end up with about £4 which is shocking

Caligula · 02/08/2006 12:15

Or a very low salary chocolatemummy. I get 80% of my childcare costs paid. I think it's the middle range which gets hit because they don't have enough to make the childcare costs comfortable, but don't get subsidised by the govt to the extent that you do if you earn under about £13K

chocolatemummy · 02/08/2006 12:43

yes, seems you are right. well i am looking forwrad to next spring when I get 2.5 hours a day free. its not much but it helps

Bozza · 02/08/2006 14:43

But caligula aren't you a single parent? Because then they are only taking into account one salary instead of two. If I didn't have DH's salary I would get help with childcare so would actually be working for more per hour after childcare, making my working more worthwhile - although obviously in overall terms I would be much worse off.

FrayedKnot · 02/08/2006 15:02

I work 4 hours/day and 2/3 my wages go on childcare costs for one child.

If I had to pay childcare for 2 children I would be going to work for a loss.

Is it not worth it to have that extra money, even if not as much as you had hoped?

I am looking at it in teh long term, getting back into job market and looking foarward to when DS starts school!

Caligula · 02/08/2006 15:05

Yes but I've looked at the entitled to site Bozza and put in my wage both as a single parent and pretending to be part of a couple, and you get the same tax credit, irrespective of whether it's earned by one person or by 2. It looks like they do it by household income as opposed to individual income now (I think this came in at round about the time they introduced the now defunct working families tax credit).

Bozza · 02/08/2006 15:10

Yes but what I meant was my salary (because it is that that makes it worthwhile for me to work) as compared to your salary. Not ours (mine and DH's). Sorry - i'm getting fairly hypothetical now...

Original poster

sqwerty · 02/08/2006 15:12

yes i will be slightly better off and will have to do it any way coz we need the money. But it's a bit annoying that i'll be working 5 half days a week and bring home £40.

OP posts:

Charlene1 · 07/08/2006 23:38

When my job starts in September, I will get around £80 - £90 pw gross, so our income will be around £23k. We get to keep the child tax credit of £52 pw unless our income miraculously goes over £45k. My childcare will cost £86 pw. so I would get maximum about £4 wages. However, working tax credit will give me around £68 towards childcare. So I actually pay £18 from wages, leaving a total net wage of about £62 pw. In theory anyway...
If I went back to work full time and paid out more childcare, I would still come out with about the same, due to increased costs and decreased WTC, so if you can work part time only, go for it!

NattyandThomas · 08/08/2006 19:42

ok im really confused with all of your tax credits.
between us my partner and i earn 30K a year and we get 200 a week in tax credits including childcare. therefore the tax credits pays fully for the childcare. this means we are on the same wage as we were before i went on maternity leave. i was told that they will pay up to 80% childcare, but having read some of your comments i am considering not having a second child! do they only pay for 80% of one child?

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