Help! What can I do for £1 a week!

[jeepjeep4]

Hi everyone sorry if that's a click-baity title but that's literally all I need...

My DC turns 3 soon and will (hopefully) be eligible for the 30 hours free childcare funding at the start of the next term which will be January. As many of you DMs will know, to be eligible for this funding, both of the child's parents need to be working and earning the equivalent of 16hrs per week at minimum wage.

My issue is that I work two days per week currently at above minimum wage, but term time only (38 weeks per year). Over the year, this equates to £4 per month under the threshold for being eligible for the funding.

I have asked my current job about the possibility to increase my hours and they have said there's no budget nor business need at the moment.

I know there's the universal 15 hours childcare so it's not the end of the world if I can't scrape the earnings together for 30 hours eligibility but it just feels such a shame to miss out when my earnings are so close to what's needed.

So, my question is, does anyone have any ideas of part time (maybe one other day per week) work that I could apply for to fit around when DC goes to nursery?

Bar work out of the question as no evening child care so would have to be during the day preferable school hours.

Or, any way I can have even £1 extra per week income that counts towards the eligibility criteria?

Thank you in advance

The first suggestion is fraudulent

Ask at local secondary schools about becoming an exams invigilator.

You invoice, and complete self assessment tax form.

Ask your work to loan you £100 and repay it over a year 😉

Or cut your own hair, charge yourself £4? Or cut your mum's hair. Or your friend's.

Advertise as an ironing service and iron your own sheet. "£4 please Cassandra." "There you go Cassandra."

Would that be fraudulent? Considering the mischief the elite get up to I can't say I'd be all that bothered about finding £4 a month. But I appreciate everyone's morals are different

It used to be that you could claim to be self employed to get it, even if you weren't. I know because I actually am SE but for the first year of childcare you only needed to submit your SE tax number from the HMRC to be eligible, they never checked what you were earning. So for this year at least as long as you get one of those numbers from HMRC (just phone up and ask for one) you can claim to be doing self employed anything.

A while ago I saw a local hospital advertising for people to drive discharged patients home from hospital and get some shopping in. You might be able to do something like this on an ad hoc basis. Otherwise, cleaning, ironing, hairdressing. If you had some flexibility on hours perhaps a clerk to a school governing body.

Well yeah if it’s totally fabricated income in order to gain 15hrs extra funding of course it’s fraud. Couldn’t care less morally speaking but if the Op decides to take your dodgy advice then she ought to at least be aware that she would be committing fraud.

Paper round. Seriously. We have a local free paper and the pay is OK plus easy exercise.

You clean for one neighbor, they clean for you?

Seems ridiculous work won't give you a 5 or 10p rise to get you over the £4 extra per month.

if you are going to use the 30 funded hours to pick up more work then why not just start looking for that role now ? If you secure the job now things may be a squeeze until Jan when the free hours kick in, but it’s perfectly achievable.

Everywhere is hiring seasonal staff now so be a good time to get a shop role (if that’s something you are interested in)

Or look for school admin roles, exam invigilating, tutoring, lunch time supervisor roles, etc.

To be honest…. With the barbering for example no one is actually going to verify if you have done a cut. You could feasibly have been paid in cash you just need a paper trail so a receipt/invoice per month.
You’re not obliged to report it to HMRC if you earn less than £1000pa from self employment and generally HMRC are much more interested in people under declaring their income than over declaring it!

Baby sitting? It doesn't need to be in the evening, it could be walking a child to/from school or to an activity.

Deliver take away food? Again it doesn't have to be in the evening.

People over declaring income is quite common in counter fraud- it’s done to gain the right to reside and claim benefits and also avoid the benefit cap.

Over declaring by 4hrs may sound trivial but those extra 15hrs of funding per week over a whole year probably adds up to quite a lot.

That comment was for @User0610134057

Yeah I was going to suggest this. I used to have a woman who would watch my kids after school. She brought her own child. My kids were older so didn't need looking after more of an adult to be on hand if necessary.